


That Awkward Moment When You’re Just A Kid From Queens

by Anti_Social_Headphones_Kid



Series: The Unmentioned Awkwardness of being the youngest Avenger [3]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Author Is Sleep Deprived, Ceiling Vent Clint Barton, Gen, How Do I Tag, I'm Sorry, Identity Reveal, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Not Beta Read, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Peter Parker is a Mess, Peter Parker is a Walking/Human Disaster, Post-Civil War (Marvel), Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Sam Wilson is So Done, Secret Identity, The Avengers Are Good Bros, Tony Stark Has A Heart
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2020-07-26
Packaged: 2020-10-25 21:00:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 43,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20730674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anti_Social_Headphones_Kid/pseuds/Anti_Social_Headphones_Kid
Summary: Everything's gotten so contrived since he 'officially' met the Avengers, and even though Peter still wants his identity to remain secret, what we want isn't always what we get... classic Parker luck---or---The Avengers need to learn how to be chill with a teenager...(part 3 of the series, you might be confused if you haven't read the other parts tbh...)(((only rated T for swearing!!!)))





	1. 'I want those pictures of Spider-Man on my desk tomorrow' 'it's a good thing I got'em today' 'these look like fucking selfies' 'ha that's crazy do you have money?'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okokokokokok- first off, I wanna say a huge thank you to MacyGracie for drawing this awesome picture from my fic!!!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH OMFG HHHHHH I LOVE IT!!!! seriously guys, go check it out  
https://macygracie.tumblr.com/post/187797523818/ive-been-reading-this-really-great-fanfiction
> 
> Heeyyyyy- if your new to the series, then welcome!! This is is part 3 of a 3-part series (unless ya'll want one more after I'm done, we'll see), so if you wanna read those before this one, that'd be great, it'll probably be much less confusing since I'm planning to reference the other ones quite a bit!!
> 
> for those returning, thanks for sticking around, your support has been so awesome, ily!!! Also you're already aware of this hellscape we're about to sink into, so let's get started, shall we??

They all understood what it was like to get bad press, but the consistent hatred that Spidey had to deal with was just wrong, especially after meeting the man and knowing of his pure-hearted desire to help anyone no matter how small the issue may be.

But as much as the Avengers disliked the negative view that the media presented for Spider-Man, they often found themselves unable to avoid it- much like tonight- they were all casually watching the news after a training session, chatting peacefully as the tv played in the background, waiting for the food they ordered to arrive, when they all snapped to attention as the reporter on-screen mentioned Spider-Man.

_ “There are many differing opinions on Spider-Man, from being called havoc bringing masked menace, to a humble hero from home, it’s hard to know just who exactly Spider-Man is, and whether his heroics are helping or hurting. _

_ “We interviewed the photographer responsible for some of the nearly impossible-to-get Spider-man photos in the Daily Bugle. He’s one of the few people who have been able to successfully, and regularly catch Queens local web-slinger in action.” _

The imagery on the screen changed to the familiar scenery outside _ ‘The Daily Bugle’ _, showing two people- one of which was clearly the reporter there for the interview, standing neatly and calmly before the camera- while the one being interviewed looked quite young, no more than nineteen- obviously nervous about being in the news- was clearly a student, who looked to be desperately in need of a coffee.

“Mr. Parker, you’ve seen Spider-Man work up-close for almost every one of his fights.” The interviewer on the screen stated, “So please tell us- what are your thoughts on the web-slinger from Queens? Are his heroics benefiting the city? Or should the hero hang up his mask and leave the superhero escapades to the Avengers?”

The boy looked dead-beat tired, but his response was almost immediate as if he had been waiting to speak his mind on this subject for an unhealthy amount of time.

“He should leave it to the Avengers if you ask me-“ the kid started, “I mean, yeah, he has a suit and some weight-lifting skills, but other then that? He’s been bringing up more trouble than necessary, and he’s not even an Avenger, so yeah, do we need him? No. Heck, I could put on a colourful onesie and do the same stunts as him, but do I? No, because I have more to do with my life than just pretend to be a her-“

The tv went silent, as did the room. The Avengers had been so caught up in the interview that they hadn’t noticed the window open as someone entered, nor the _thwip _when a web had shot at the remote, which now was being held by the person in question.

It was hard to tell what he was feeling since his expression was hidden behind the mask, but no one could be feeling anything positive after hearing something like that. It wasn’t a surprise that the normally talkative vigilante was unusually silent, but seeing his downtrodden stance, he seemed so heartbreakingly… defeated.

Natasha was studying him as if she could see right through the mask to the rejection that he was probably feeling, while Steve tried to go for a comforting glance, but it came out a more of a grimace. Rhodey and Clint were both giving him looks of pity, but Sam kept his eyes on the screen as if his glares at the photographer would carry through to the other side. Vision seemed mostly confused by the interview, and Wanda kept her head down, knowing all too well what it was like to be told you were useless and a danger. Tony had turned away from everyone in the room, attempting to hide his anger, but he was visibly vibrating with emotion, as Spider-Man just continued to stare at the screen intently.

“Say that to my face you limp noodle.” Spider-Man chided at the tv.

All the Avengers stared at Spidey in utter shock/confusion. Except for Tony who now had both hands covering his face, and was still turned away from the others.

Steve was the first to recover from the shock.

“Spider-Man… I’m sorry, I know this is hard to go through, we’ve all experienced it, and truthfully, it never gets easier. But what matters is the people you’re able to help, not the publicity-“

“I know Mr. Rogers,” he cut off shortly, obviously trying to hide his pain. He winced as the words came out, “I-I mean, th-thanks um, but I’ll be fine, just uh, this guy sounds like a real jerk, y’ know?”

“Tell me about it,” Natasha spoke up, “I’d love to talk to this guy, I’m pretty sure I could have him apologizing pretty quickly.”

“I mean, does this punk seriously think it’s that easy to become a hero?” Sam adds, “Let me tell you Spidey, even if he did have the same powers and skillsets as you, he wouldn’t be able to become Spider-Man, not like you. He wouldn’t have the mental or moral strength to deal with all this.”

“Th-thanks Mr. Wilson…” the vigilante mumbled, obviously embarrassed but pleased with the attention.

It was at this point that Tony finally decided to leave the room, his emotions getting the better of him.

Clint gave out a small laugh. “I wouldn’t be surprised if Tony was going to have that Parker kid fired right now for his awful interview.”

“Hey! It wasn’t _that _bad. Sure he seemed a little nervous, but considering it was last minute and they just swarmed him after school, he still seemed pretty collected if you ask me, and like, he gave the best response he could think of, right? So it’s hardly his fault for having his own opinion, he def-definitely shouldn’t get fired over this is what I mean,” the arachnid defended, crossing his arms.

“Spidey,” Wanda said curiously, “why are you defending the interview? It was literally just about how this kid hates you.”

“Oh! Um, well, I’d hate for him to lose his job, y’ know? I mean, he could be in a really tough spot financially, and like, have to earn money for his family- whatever’s left of it, since he could be an orphan, and like yeah! What if his parents are dead, and like, he only has an aunt or whatever, and things are kinda tough for them? So whatever little money he earns he needs and stuff, and I’d uh, hate to make it worse, y’ know…”

Another uncomfortable silence filled the room before someone dared to respond.

“Woah,” Sam finally said, “you just came up with a tragic backstory to defend a random child who you’ve never met before, who hates your guts.”

“Yeah, well, I kinda hate myself too, so we already have a lot in common. And just remember- nobody can hate you more than you already hate yourself.” Spider-Man said with a small chuckle in an attempt to hide the fact that his voice was breaking towards the end.

“Are you sure you’re ok Queens?” Steve asked softly.

“Of course I’m fine, I’m pretty used to being bashed out by the Daily Bugle anyway, so just having some whiney photographer of theirs -_ who I’ve never met _\- hate on me, isn’t really gonna upset-“

“But that’s the thing,” Natasha cut in, “I’m pretty sure I’ve met him. We’ve all met him.”

A mixture of surprised reactions and murmured questions filled the room until Wanda spoke up clearly: “She’s right, we’ve all met him- Stark’s intern, I think. I talk to him sometimes, he helps personally repair our stuff in Tony’s workshop.”

There was another wave of silence as this all clicked in with them. 

“Shit, wasn’t that kid just a high schooler?” Clint asked.

“He seemed like such a nice boy.” Steve nodded, as Rhodey went through a mixture of expressions with this new information.

There were various other agreements from the other Avengers. It was understandable why Tony was so mad now; his own intern, a special exception at that- he was younger than any of the other interns _and _given access to Stark’s personal lab- and he had gone and hated on the one person that seemed nearly impossible to hate. Sure Spider-Man could be annoying at times and had an unhealthy disregard for his own safety, but he wanted to help people more than anything, even in the smallest ways.

“I almost feel bad for Peter,” Natasha broke in, “Stark is going to ruin his life.”

“Yeah, I bet,” Spider-Man said miserably. It was clear that he wasn’t as fine with the negative interview as he said he was. As he left to go get food from the kitchen, the Avengers went silent.

“So who here wants some revenge on Peter?” Wanda asked after a moment.

“I’m in,” Natasha responded immediately, causing the others to stare questioningly at her. “What? Us spiders need to stick together, not to mention he’s earning money off of Spider-Man just to fuel the papers that give him the most hate.”

“Me too,” Sam added. “No one gets to pick on him but us.”

“Guy’s, revenge isn’t the right thing to do,” Rhodey interrupted, “and if Tones has anything to say about it, the poor kid’s life will already be ruined- plus I doubt Spider-Man would be on board with this.”

“Relax, we aren’t going to tell Spidey about it, and we won’t ruin the kid’s life, just have a nice little chat with him…” Natasha had a glimmer of cruel joy in her voice.

* * *

As soon as Tony was safely in his lab alone, he allowed himself to burst into laughter as he remembered the kid’s awkward stance as he came in to see himself on the tv. He would’ve done anything to see Peter’s facial expression, but he settled for what little emotion the mask could explain with the eyes expanding and dilating like pupils. 

He had just barely been keeping it together when the interview first came on because one- Peter had mentioned that he'd gotten a job, but he _hadn’t _mentioned that he got a job taking selfies of himself throughout the day, two- Peter was now doing an interview, on a state-wide broadcasted channel, about _himself_, but he had to speak in third-person the whole time, and thirdly- it essentially just ended up being Peter hating on himself.

He _was_ slightly concerned if Peter had really meant what he'd said about himself in terms of unworthiness, and made a mental note to talk to him about it later, but first...

“F.R.I.D.A.Y, do you have the footage from the living room, just a few minutes ago?”

_ “Yes, boss. Would you like me to play it?” _

“Yes, and add it to my favourites would you?”

“_Sure thing boss.”_

The recording started to play, showing the Avengers as they had been before Peter entered: watching the interview with shocked, angry, confused, and hurt expressions (other than Tony whose hands were covering his face). They weren’t doing much in the video, but already Tony was dying from laughter.

* * *

Peter wanted to disappear.

At the time it had seemed like a good idea: no one would expect you to give _yourself _bad publicity, so it would help with the whole secret identity thing, plus, it would help him avoid the worsening amount of questions about how only _he _was able to get good photos of Spider-Man so far.

But, he forgot that the Avengers were real people and that _they _would see the interview too. It had been a super-awkward conversation, seeing as they were trying to help him feel better by getting angry at the other him, but now it was over, and everyone would probably forget about it soon- after all, who even remembers what some random high schooler said on the news a week ago? They had all been doting on him since he was the newest member of the team, which was nice, but at the same time a little embarrassing. At least it was over with now, and the most he would be getting was a few looks of pity throughout the day. 

And maybe they would let him choose the movie for tonight…

The only person who most certainly _not _forget about this was Mr. Stark. He practically had to run from the room he was laughing so hard.

He was probably saving the files at this moment. Just then, Peter’s phone started to buzz.

“Hel-“

“PETER!!! THE NEWS!!! BRO WHAT WERE YOU THINKING???”

_ Oh yeah, and Ned, Ned would definitely never let him live this down. _

* * *

Rhodey still wasn’t sure where he stood on the whole ‘Spider-Man identity’ thing.

On one hand, he could believe what actual trained spies were telling him, along with the rest of the Avengers, that Spider-Man was an actual _man _ (as in age) and had a wife and an actual _child_.

Or, he could believe what he had been seeing this past while- the stuff he hadn’t even been _trying _to see but saw anyways- the way Tony acted with both Spider-Man and the kid were way too familiar considering how he didn’t see them together that often. If you considered the combined amount of time together though? Then they were practically as close as him and Tony, or hell, even Pepper.

So yes, he was almost fully sure that Spider-Man was Tony’s intern that he had had such an odd interaction with. So for the sake of his friend, the colonel was doing everything he could to forget what he saw that night- his face, his name- part of him felt bad to try and purposely forget the kid, but he knew it was for the best. Unfortunately, though, he didn’t do a good enough job trying to forget, since the moment he saw the face onscreen, he realized how familiar the person looked… but it _could _be anyone since he didn’t get a good look at his face, jeez, now every kid he looks at he’s thinking is Spider-

The kid spoke.

Yeah, no, that was the intern.

But was it Spider-Man?

The interview was stopped. Spider-Man was there.

_ “Nobody can hate you more, then you already hate yourself.” _

Wow, this guy was _not _subtle- how did he have a secret identity again? Still though, as the conversation went on, he continued to drone it out, considering it all in his head, still fighting the inevitable result that Peter- oh great, he couldn’t even forget the kid’s _name _\- was quite possibly Spider-Man.

No, no it wasn’t him- and he would keep telling himself that until Spidey confirmed or denied it _in his own time_. It was the least he could do.

* * *

Peter was on his way home from school, but he found himself walking at a quicker pace than usual…

Maybe he was just going crazy. It was about time he finally snapped, he knew he had it coming eventually… Peter whipped around, only to see relatively safe surroundings for what must’ve been the millionth time that day.

He had felt like someone was following him since early that day as he made his way to school, and at this point, he wasn’t sure if he was just overly-anxious, or if his spider-senses had just hit the_‘eternal vibrate’ _button, but it’s was really starting to get on his nerves.

Ned had been concerned over him pretty much the whole day, and even MJ noticed that he was jumpier than usual (though she _was_ pretty perceptive). He had just shrugged them off and said he was fine, even convincing himself to a point, but as soon as school was over and he split ways with Ned, he felt himself become on high-alert again as the presence became even stronger.

He was in New York, and there were people everywhere, it was stupid to think someone was following him, right?

He spotted Delmar’s up ahead, where he had been planning to stop, but instead, he walked past. He was going home. Now.

The alleyway he usually got changed into his suit looked appealing- well, the thought of changing into his suit was appealing, not so much the alleyway- but he passed it, not wanting to place his identity on the line. Maybe he should just take the bus home… sure it was kinda pricy for a distance he could easily walk (or swing) but he was sure May wouldn’t mind as long as it was for his safety (if she knew it was about his safety she would’ve begged him to take the bus despite his powers).

Before he could consider where the closest bus stop was, his spider-senses bleared randomly, and he quickly ducked into the ally without a second thought and quickly ran to hide behind the dumpster. He could’ve run through to the other side of the ally, but something told him that whoever was chasing him would have both sides covered… worst-case scenario, he could just climb the walls and pass it off as really good bouldering…

He heard soft footsteps approaching from either side of him. He sighed and prepared to fight- he may want to keep his identity hidden, but that didn’t mean he was about to let himself be mugged without putting up as much of a fight as possible without overusing his powers.

Peter stood up and prepared to face whoever had come his way, knowing he probably should’ve called Mr. Stark or May by now, but he’d faced enough muggers to know what to expect by now…

Until he saw the faces of his supposed muggers.

It turns out, he did _not _know what to expect.

* * *

Admittedly, Wanda, Sam, and Natasha _did _feel bad for scaring the poor kid so much, but on the other hand, this was also the kid who had the guts to badmouth one of their friends on tv, so it was pretty equal ground.

Wanda and Sam stepped into the alleyway on one side as Natasha made her entrance on the other (Clint had wanted to come with them as well, but it was his week off). They stepped closer but the kid still didn’t show himself, so Sam quickened his step until he came face-to-face with the kid, staring him straight in the eyes, more terror than relief being displayed in them once he realized he had been surrounded by three Avengers.

Sam crossed his arms, not dropping eye contact with the teen, although the kid did everything in his power to lose eye-contact with Sam.

“Um, can I help you guys?” The kid asked weakly, still not looking up.

“Yes, actually,” Wanda spoke up. “We wanted to ask you about that interview last week on Spider-Man,” she informed, though this only caused the kid to look up in confusion. 

“Yo-you’re only here because of the interview?” He asked in almost hopeful relief.

“Yes…” Natasha confirmed. “Why do you look so happy about that?”

“Wha? I-I’m not happy about it,” he stuttered. “It’s just, it’s super cool that you guys saw it and stuff, I-I didn’t think you watched stuff like that…”

“'Stuff’ like the news?”

“Yes, I mean, no, I know you guys watch the news, just like, it’s kinda surreal that you saw _ me _ on the news, y’ know?”

“Yeah, we happened to hear what you said about our friend too,” Sam regarded.

“Oh-_oh_, you guys are- are you here about that? Th-that’s why your here, is cause your mad at me?”

“Well, we aren’t exactly here to congratulate you.”

“Shit, um, I’m sorry for talking bad about Spider-Man, ok? It was wrong of me, just please, my aunt will freak if she sees I got hurt, so-“

“Whoa, slow down kid, we aren’t going to hurt you,” Sam said raising his hands in defeat.

“You-you aren’t?”

“Who exactly do you think we are? You know, there’s this thing that Spider-Man always says, about how with great power comes responsibility too. Look, kid, what you said last week was broadcast to thousands- do you know what kind of impact that has? That’s a lot of power right there, even if it was only a few seconds long, those words still stick in peoples mind’s, even if they don’t remember who said it- what I’m trying to say is, that you could’ve used your words to have a real effect on others, not just talk bad about Spider-Man,” Sam finished, still trying to make eye-contact with the kid, but his head was lowered in shame, or possibly thought.

After a few seconds of silence from the four in the alleyway, the kid lifted his head a little and look Sam in the eye.

“But what if I don’t think Spider-Man is a worthy hero? I mean, I live in Queens, I photograph him a lot, so I’ve seen all his successes first-hand, but I’ve also seen every single one of his failures too- ones that you guys probably don’t even know about- so what if I really believed it was better for him to leave it up to the Avengers?”

“I’ve made plenty of mistakes,” Wanda spoke up. “But I’m considered an Avenger. So, do you consider me a hero? Or am I not worthy of the Avengers either?”

“What? No, of course, you’ve saved like, so many people- you’ve saved the world!”

“So what makes Spider-Man any different?”

“He hasn’t saved the world…”

“Alright,” Sam said, his annoyance starting to creep into his voice a little. “I’ll admit that I hardly keep track of anything that guy does but-” the kid low-key looked offended when he said this, but he continued, “-that guy does _way _too much for me to keep up with in the first place, like sure, he hasn’t saved the world on a global scale, but he _has_ saved some people’s entire worlds.”

The kid still looked confused, so Sam explained. “You’ve seen him stop muggings right? Or someone from being raped?” The boy nodded. “Well, that was probably easy for him to fight, but for those people? Sometimes that’s the last of the money they so desperately need, or the people he saves from rape- I don’t think I need to explain what that can do to people- so like I was saying, he hasn’t saved the world before, but he has saved the worlds of so many individuals in the city, and I can guarantee you that when the day comes, he’ll save the world too.”

“T-thanks…” the kid mumbled, sounding slightly like he was choked up for some reason. Must be getting sick, or allergies, maybe?

“Why are_ you _thanking _us?” _ Wanda asked confusedly under her breath, but strangely enough, the kid heard her.

“Uh, I meant that- um, thank you for explaining it to me…”

Sam laughed and patted the kid’s shoulder. “Y’know, you're a pretty good kid when you aren’t trash-talking my friends. I can see why Stark chose you as his intern.”

“You… you remember me?”

“Yeah,” he said casually as if it hadn’t been Natasha who’d reminded them when they first saw the interview. He sure as hell wouldn’t have recognized him, all teenagers looked the same to him- like the one he had met in Washington with the British accent looked eerily similar to the kid in front of him. But that didn’t seem to matter right now since it had seemed to make the intern incredibly happy.

The three said their goodbyes to the kid who had overall seemed pretty casual about the whole thing, but then again, he _did _intern for Stark, so maybe he had grown a sort of indifference to things like that.

* * *

“So that’s what it was, huh?” Rhodey stated after hearing the three recount their story.

“Yeah, I actually feel bad now,” Nat admitted. “We didn’t do any real harm, I mean, but still, we gave that poor kid a scare.”

“You guys really didn’t have to do this,” Spider-Man commented, his emotions hard to place.

“You’d do it for us,” Sam stated, “we have your back Spidey, whether or not you like it.”

Natasha glanced over to Tony, whose face looked strained as he thought over the new information.

“Stark,” the Spy waited until he looked up to show she had his attention before continuing. “I know you had a lot of trust for Peter, and I know you felt betrayed by all this, but he’s a good kid, and he didn’t mean to cause any harm. It’s not up to me, but I think you should give him another chance before you fire him.”

Tony hummed and faced Spider-Man.

“What do you think Spidey? Should I fire the kid for you?”

Spider-Man’s eyes drastically widened as he shot up straight in his seat. 

“No Mr. Stark! I can’t…. have someone suffer for, uh… this?” 

“That was a pretty weak refusal, I’m getting the sense that you _ do _ want him fired.”

“I-I don’t. Want him fired.”

Tony stared down the arachnid a moment before deciding, “I’ll let him stay, on account that he doesn’t talk like that about you again. Deal?”

“I’m still allowed to talk bad about myself?”

Tony frowned at this comment, but Spider-Man interrupted him before he could say another word.

“It's a deal, Mr. Stark.”

The Avengers stared back between the two, knowing something had just happened- something that they had missed- and they didn’t know exactly what it was.

* * *

Pepper had asked Rhodey to go and convince Tony to leave the lab for a bit, and maybe actually eat, so that’s why he was currently in the lab, which Tony was in fact, not currently in. The kid was there though.

He wasn’t entirely sure what to do, but he didn’t have much time to think it through (and he was pretty tired), so he kept it friendly, and to the basics.

“Hey Peter, is Tony in here?”

“No, he uh, he went to get some food, he’ll be back soon though I think, or he’s probably in the kitchen right now, or-“

He held up his hands to prevent him from listing off every possible place in the compound. “I gotcha- thanks Spidey, see you tomorrow,” he was slightly amused when he thought about how frequently the vigilante rambled. Usually, he’d be happy to listen, but he was already pretty tired as it was, and he was sure the kid would understand.

“Uhm… ye-yeah, goodnight sir?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> RHODEY KNOWS AND PETER KNOWS THAT RHODEY KNOWS- I mean like, finally, amiright? (shut up, I know I'm the one who wrote this mess)
> 
> Thanks for reading!! <333
> 
> Sorry this chapter was a bit weak, but I always find it so super daunting to write the first chapter, so I figured I'd just get it out of the way just so the rest of the chapters would be easier to write!


	2. "that was maJeSTIc"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carol is a fucking GODDESS

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the positivity on the last chapter!! 
> 
> I really hope you enjoy this one too!!

Peter watched as the colonel stepped out of the room and into the hallway towards the distant light in the kitchen. He waited until the door had shut, and was again left alone.

He was alone.

But he still couldn’t bring himself to move a muscle or make a sound… Had- had Rhodey just called him ’Spidey?’

As in Spidey, Spidey? Like his actual alter-ego that no one was supposed to know about, but found out anyway? Was he going to have to add Rhodey to the relatively small-but-considering-it-was-supposed-to-be-blank long list of people that knew who he was?

He inwardly groaned as he realized that Rhodey knowing just meant he had another Iron babysitter now.

How long had he known anyways? Did Mr. Stark tell him? Did the other Avengers all know too?

This was a mess, like most everything else in his life.

He collapsed onto his chair and put his head in his hands as if it would make the headache of his life go away, when he heard voices coming from down the hall, sounding very much like Rhodey and Tony fighting about something, most likely him.

Not even realizing what he was doing, Peter got up from his seat and headed towards the kitchen, where the voices were coming from.

* * *

The moment Rhodey stepped out of the lab, he realized what he had just said.

“Shit,” he exclaimed quietly, debating if he should go back in and explain… but he couldn’t bring himself to reenter, so instead, he walked in the opposite direction towards the kitchen where Tony was currently pulling out a pizza from the oven, and sat down on a bar stool. When Tony turned around to place the pizza on the countertop, he seemed to be surprised to see Rhodey as the person sitting there instead of some fifteen-year-old kid…

“Hey, Platyipu-“

“Oh god,” Rhody said in sudden realization. “Tony, please don’t tell me he’s fifteen.”

“What? Who?” Tony asked, slightly baffled.

“Your intern- how old is he?”

Tony sighed as he finally realized what his friend was getting at, what his friend had just found out. He lowered his eyes and took a deep inhale before answering, “he’s sixteen.”

“Tony-“ Rhodey started, but the billionaire held up his hands for silence.

“I know, I know what you're going to say already, but-“

“No Tony, this isn’t just some random decision you can get away with- this is a life, an actual child’s life, and you're just letting him do this? Wait- he’s sixteen now? How old was he in Germany then?”

“I said he was on the young side-“

“Fifteen…” Rhodey said in shock. “He was fifteen, and that was your backup plan? Give a suit to some random fifteen-year-old? And then after, you just let him keep it? Where did you find him? Was he just your intern that you decided to make into a superhero just because he was available?”

“I actually wasn’t available,” a voiced chimed in from behind causing the colonel to freeze as he realized that Spider-Man, or Peter, or _whatever_ his name was, had joined the two of them, and turned to see the teen leaning against the wall, looking slightly intimidating, which was almost surprising since he was the youngest person in the room, and without the suit he was also currently the weakest.

Rhodey tried to form words, but he couldn’t think of a thing to say- being left speechless in the presence of a teenager- not his greatest moment.

“What?” He finally managed to choke out in response.

“I actually wasn’t available to go to Germany, it was like, in the middle of the school year after all, and I did have homework, but Mr. Stark cleared it all up for me, so it still worked out I guess.”

Rhodey nodded slowly, painfully aware that he still probably looked shocked, but he didn’t currently have the will-power to wipe the expression off his face. It was one thing to have been suspecting him of being Spider-Man, but it was another thing entirely to have it confirmed.

There was no ignoring that his voice was quite clearly the same as Spider-Man, but other than that it was almost strange to think that this kid in front of him was the same Spider-Man they had all come to know and love recently.

For one, Peter was lacking confidence in the way he moved and spoke, whereas Spider-Man was almost always dripping with confidence, though perhaps this change in behaviour was due to the fact that Rhodey had just been questioning him- which he did feel bad for, especially since he actually did consider him his friend, it was mostly just he didn’t understand why on earth this random teenager was ok to go around sacrificing his own time and safety- and why the hell did Tony pick him for the mission in Germany?

Another thing that was starting to throw Rhodey off was seeing Spider-Man as a human, and not a suit- not that he didn’t think he was human, but it was really hard to tell emotions when the only facial changes he made were his eyes widening and dilating. But even after hardly a minute of being in the same room as him, Rhodey could see how emotional he actually was, and it was almost scary to see someone you previously thought unbreakable look so naturally fragile.

“Ok, sorry,” Rhodey interrupted. “I’m just still trying to grasp this- how the hell do you two even know each other?”

“Well, quite clearly, everyone knows of me,” Tony answered, being of no help.

“Uh, I-I'm Spider-Man?” Peter answered confusedly.

"No, no I meant like how did you two even meet? Did he kept tabs on your work at school or something?”

“Nooo… not at school- like he watched videos on YouTube of when I stopping buses and stopping muggings- y’ know, that stuff.”

“What the hell are kids doing with their spare time these days?” Rhodey muttered under his breath.

“To be fair, most kids my age don’t really do this sort of thing,” he responded to Rhodey’s question, causing the colonel to look up in surprise.

“How loudly did I say that?” He wondered aloud.

“I couldn’t hear you,” Tony volunteered. “The kid’s got freaky hearing though, remember?”

“Wait- hold up, so it’s not your suit that increases your hearing? So is it sorta like how Clint has good eyesight?”“Ye-yeah, I guess?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well like, Ummm…” he shrugged helplessly. “I dunno where I was going with that…” he mumbled.

“That’s ok-" he brushed aside, not wanting the kid to feel more awkward than he already did. "-So Tones, you found him because of his good hearing?”

This comment caused the two of them to stop and stare at Rhodey, Tony looking almost what you might call baffled, but still hiding his utter confusion under a thread of dignity, while Peter just pressed his mouth into a line, looking like he understood what Rhodey was asking, but already dreading the conversation that was coming.

“Rhodes…” Tony started slowly, still slightly confused himself. “You know that Peter’s a superhuman, right? All his powers...”

Rhodey did not know.

He huffed a slight laugh before staring into his friend’s eyes and realizing he was serious. Turning back around to where the kid was standing, he looked at him in question, and he nodded in confirmation, his eyes glued to the ground as he nodded.

“So… it isn’t the suit?”

“The webs are just the suit,” Peter assured him in a hurry. “But the rest is just… me.”

“Holy shit… how did you even get your powers- wait, it’s ok if you don’t want to answer that, I know being experimented on is probably traumatizing, I don’t wanna force you to talk-“

“It’s ok, I wasn’t experimented on, I was just… y’ know, bit by a spider…”

“…”

Rhodey looked at his best friend to see if the kid was joking, but Tony just shrugged and nodded.

“So a spider-“

“-Yep,” Peter cut off, popping the ‘P’, and heading over to the cupboards and grabbing the cherry pop-tarts out of the cabinet, and began to eat them without heating them up first.

He moved to sit on the chair next to Rhodey, casually sitting down and acting as if everything was fine like it was normal for them to be hanging together like this. Eventually, the conversation took a turn for the normal, mostly it just being Peter and Tony conversing among themselves while Rhodey was still trying to get a grasp of the situation.

* * *

As much as he liked hanging out with the Avengers, he still had a job, a responsibility to take care of.

And let’s be real- swinging around with freakin superpowers did kinda beat hanging out with people- not that he’d take it over knowing the Avengers, but he would take it over watching Clint try to lure the others into the ventilation system so they would get stuck and he could laugh at them later (hey, it actually takes a lot of skill to travel via vents).

He wasn’t avoiding the compound just because he had absolutely no fucking clue how to act around Rhodey…

The thing is, it wasn’t like the colonel had been rude when he found out, though he did eventually admit that he had suspected it for a while- and even then, he still freaked out when he initially found out about his age.

So no, he wasn’t really avoiding Rhodey, but he was just reminded again that he wasn’t who everyone was expecting him to be, and once again he felt trapped by Avengers having unrealistic expectations of him- only this time it was literally all his fault for pretending to be someone who would meet those expectations- and being around them only reminded him that in the end, they probably wouldn’t accept him like they did now once they figured out who he really was…

Just some kid from Queens…

He hadn’t even faced some world-ending battle or done anything really of importance. He did take down the Vulture, but even Mr. Stark himself said that the guy was ‘below their pay-grade’. And if they found out that he was only a kid with that as his only ‘real’ super-villain? They definitely would treat him differently.

Trying to distract himself from these thoughts, he shot out another web without looking and swinging around the corner, slamming right into the side of a building.

He quickly stuck himself to the side of the building before he could fall, his head throbbing from the crash. But I mean, all things considered, he was doing good, or at least he’d been trying to, and he would continue his attempts at crime-fighting as soon as he felt motivated to stop imitating a squashed bug on a window.

Oh fuck, there are human-beings inside this building. He suddenly realized and opened his eyes to see a considerably small crown of confused/annoyed/indifferent office employees staring at him. The one in the centre seemed to be practically vibrating with anger though- presumably the boss… he looked kinda familiar- so Peter decided it was high time to yeet himself outta there, after realizing that it was in fact, his boss at the Bugle who had been glaring at him. He thwipped away from the building, and onward to justice… or y’ know, lost dogs and stuff…

Either way, it was justice!

* * *

It was getting late now, the sun had already disappeared long ago, and if Peter delayed any longer in getting home, May would probably be incredibly worried, which was something he didn’t want to do to her, but there had been this odd group of people he had seen earlier, and his instincts had told him not to let them out of his sight.

They hadn’t exactly done anything wrong per se, other than being suspicious- and yes, he knew it was wrong to judge people on their appearances- but it wasn’t their appearance that was suspicious, it was just their overall vibe if that doesn’t sound too lazy.

He’d been hiding from their sight while following them for almost three hours now and had heard barely anything they said- until now.

Well, it wasn’t the ones he was watching that he heard, but a random voice in the sky say “I see the guy you were talking about- don’t worry, I got’ im.” Which was a strange thing to say- shit, they saw me, he realized as his spidey-senses bleared in his head as he whipped around and jumped out of the way, barely seeing who was attacking him- some weird blur of light, apparently- he was too dazed to fight back, but was still able to dodge the next two punches the entity threw at him but was unable to stop the third, and-

  
It all went black.

* * *

Peter blinked open his eyes, vaguely aware of his surroundings through the blurry haze of his vision and the distant ringing in his ears. Whatever he was laying on was soft-ish like a bed, and was overall pretty comfortable, but he still decided to push himself up into a sitting position and rib his eyes, causing them to clear up a bit.

When his vision pretty much fully returned, he realized he was sitting in a clean rather high-tech room that looked sorta similar to Mr. Stark’s lab, but if his lab was in an old basement, or like in a sewer under Italy- but still high-tech and pretty awesome overall.

There were a few other beds around him, but all of them were empty, sans his own which he was currently using.

“Hey kid,” a voice greeted, causing him to look beside him where a woman was sitting, watching him.

“Um- I… where am I, exactly? What happened? Who are you even?” He finale managed to mumbled out in question.

“First off, you’re in a Shield base,” she explained. “Second, I was coming here for a visit when some of my friends warned me that someone had been watching them all night, so I sorta took you out- sorry. I called Fury about it though, and he explained you’re the prodigy of one of his friends or something, so don’t worry, as soon as we make sure you’re alright, we’ll help you get back home. And thirdly, my name is Carol Danvers.”

Peter was still trying to get a grasp on where the hell he was, he was so fucking confused that he could hardly register what Carol was saying. It was like when Cap was explaining a mission plan to him, and he was still so caught up on figuring out how they were supposed to open the door to the base that he completely missed out on the actual plan (they didn’t have to worry about unlocking the door on that mission by the way, since Tony had easily knocked it down. Sometimes Peter forgot that they were a team of superheroes).

He was still determined to be polite though, so he continued to maintain eye-contact with her as she continued talking, even though he was finding it hard to pay attention since his head was still spinning. There was also something incredibly familiar about her…

His eyes widened as it finally clicked in for him.

“You were glowing,” he half-stated, half-asked.

“Yeah, I was…” she confirmed.

“Holy shit,” he breathed. “So that’s why my head fucking hurts.”She winced when he said that. “I’m so sorry about that, but why were you following the Skrulls anyway?”

“The what? I was just following them cuz they looked suspicious,” he answered, rubbing his head a little where it was sore. He froze as he realized that there was no fabric covering his head.

“My- my mask, where the fuck- what did you do with it?” He asked in panic, causing Carol to point where his mask was on the bed beside him with a confused expression on her face.

He desperately grabbed it and tugged it on as Carol realized her mistake.

“Shit… was I not supposed to see you?” She wondered aloud. “We had to make sure you were breathing, you could’ve been seriously hurt.”

“It’s fine,” he stated in a way that made it seem as though he was clearly not fine. “I can’t believe this, two different people found out who I was in less than two days… I must be losing it.”

“Well, if it’s of any comfort, I’ll be leaving Earth again pretty soon so you at least won’t have to worry about me,” she said with a smirk.

“You're leaving Earth?” He asked, suddenly snapping to attention, as she nodded. “That is so cool- what do you do- do you like, visit aliens? Do you know Thor?”“Sorry, that stuff’s top-secret,” she answered in mock seriousness. “But yes, there are aliens involved. So what is it you do here? Besides stalking Skrulls.”

“Oh, Uhm, just sorta small stuff I guess, compared… I haven’t had the chance to save the world or anything,” he admitted as he took off his mask- there was no point in keeping it on while she already knew what he looked like. “But I try my best to help out where I can, like robbing’s, or shootings… stuff like that. Once I helped take down some alien weapons, but other than that, nothing really of a world-ending scale.”

“That stuff isn’t ‘small’, not if it saves lives. As long as you don’t forget to keep your own life to live in the process.”

“I know what you’re thinking.”

Carol turned to look at him, she looked curious but concerned. “And what do you think I’m thinking?”

“You think I’m too young, that I should be out there trying to live for ‘myself’. But you don’t get it- I am living for myself. If-if I was to just go be normal or go party and study, or whatever- I wouldn’t be living for myself. I could never give this up willingly, I love helping people, and yeah, I’m young, but my age doesn’t have an effect on how much I can help people, right?” He looked up the woman (freakin’ goddess) helplessly, expecting her to say what he imagined the Avengers telling him a million times over.

But she didn’t.

She gave him a soft smile that had a bit of fire in it. “Y’ know, I think you’re right.”

Peter stared at her, half-expecting her to yell ’SYKE’ or he to correct her speech like ‘wait, sorry I meant-‘, but she didn’t.

“Yo-you what?”

“Look, I’m not here to tell you what you can and can’t do, and it doesn’t seem like you’re just doing this all on a whim, or for fun, right?”

He shook his head, still a little late to process what she was saying.

“I know a kid- well, she’s not a kid anymore- but she was bold, brave, and you kinda remind me of her. And when she wanted to do things, when she wanted to fight to help the world, I didn’t stop her. You’re our future- well, the earth’s future- so why the hell would I want to stop you from bettering our world now?”

They sat in silence a moment, staring off into the distance as Peter let her words sink in.

“So, you got a name kid?” She asked suddenly, breaking into the silence.

“P- Wait, you’ve already seen my face, I’m not giving you my name too,” he said playfully.

“Fine. Fury called you Spider-Man, so I’m guessing that’s what you want me to call you too?”

“Nah, my friends call me Spidey.”

Carol pressed her mouth into a line, clearly fighting back a smile as she took out a piece of paper and scribbled on it, then handed it to him.

“Here Spidey, this is my phone number, lemme know if you ever need help.”

“You have a phone? How does it work in space?”

“I’m not entirely sure, Maria gave it to me when I went to go visit a few days ago, so hell, I don’t even know if it’ll work… either way, don’t tell Fury, we want him to remain convinced I still use a pager.”

“A pager?”

“Yep.”

Eventually, Peter’s head had pretty much cleared up, so he said his goodbyes to Carol, and made his way home thinking about how she had treated him.

He hadn’t told the world who he was so he could protect his family and friends (also just for the sense of having privacy), and even though he trusted the other Avengers, he had always been afraid for what they would think, He had figured out by now that they thought he was much older than he actually was, and it just seemed to be getting harder to tell them the truth.

If they did find out one day, how much would their relationships change? He always felt this pit in his stomach whenever they interacted with him when he was just Peter, and he was so afraid of that happening when they saw who Spider-Man was- just a kid from Queens who happened to get bit by a spider. No H.Y.D.R.A testing, no super suit he had built from scraps or trained professionally in, no agent training from S.H.I.E.L.D, just someone they had once thought much more interesting when they hadn’t seen his face- when they hadn’t seen how to be disappointed with him.

Hell, Rhodey had just found out, and it had played out pretty much like he'd expected, only Rhodey had been slightly more chill since he'd seen how Mr. Stark treated him differently, but either way it had still made things incredibly awkward.

But Carol- when she saw him, she didn’t look at him as unqualified, or as a disappointment just because he didn’t have many years of experience, but instead she looked like she saw how qualified he was, and how much experience he would gain.

When she saw him, she didn’t see nostalgia of the past and how they could’ve done things better then, she saw the promise of the future, and how he was doing everything he could to better the world now.

She had faith in him, and that was one of the best things anyone had given him.

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

* * *

**Six Years Later:**

“He-hey, I’m Peter Parker.”

“Hey Peter Parker, you have something for me?”

Peter didn’t know if he was going to live through to ever see anyone again- hell, he had just died like, ten minutes ago. He didn’t have time to thank everyone for the time they spent together, he didn’t have time to properly thank Carol for motivating him, so he at least wanted to give her his name. He trusted her with his name, and he trusted her with the gauntlet.

And she trusted him to protect the earth for the next generation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Sorry this chapter wasn't that great, I sorta wrote it in a rush when I came home cuz I just really needed something with Carol after this disgusting 70-ish year old guy hit on me, a MINOR, at the gym. I'm so repulsed rn I can't even function. Like I feel awful cuz I feel like it was my fault for even talking to him, but I genuinely didn't want to be rude or judge someone based on what they seemed like, so I guess next time I should just listen to my gut or whatever.
> 
> anyways, I stayed for like, five more min, but he kept looking at me and I felt really uncomfortable, so I just left and came home to write this since Carol is so awesome to think about, and I'm feeling slightly better now... so I guess this is sort-of a self-care chapter? sorry for inflicting u guys lol
> 
> And she'll be back soon!! no one can prevent her return...
> 
> also I know that time-skip was sort-of out of nowhere, but I really wanted to put it it- dw tho, the it won't affect the rest of the fic, it'll continue on the normal time-line!


	3. dragon tales, drAGON TALEs, iTS almoSt tiMe FOr drAgON taLEs  *Peter and Ned dancing*

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhodey remembers that it's pretty unlikely that Ned is Peter's son

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're back on our usual story vibessss yaaaaay... sorry abt yesterday, (this is low-key to make up for having a non-comedic chapter this week) I just really needed to write that, but it ended up clearing up my writers block, so that's good!! 
> 
> LET'S DO THISssss

It was lab day and Mr. Stark had just left to go welcome Pepper back from her business trip, so Peter was left alone in the lab for the next while, which wasn’t really a big deal since he was often left alone to work, and honestly found that it was easier to work alone (sometimes) since that meant he could hook Karen up to the main system- not that Friday wasn’t helpful, but it was just better to have Karen in control instead since she had all his notes.

There had been a recent error in the suit that caused it to be baggy even when he pressed the button in the middle- and that had ended up being a pretty sucky day since he looked quite floppy when he swung around the city in it- so that was the first thing on his list to fix when he had come in that day.

“Alright Kare, it looks pretty much done, right?” He asked, staring up at the ceiling as he spoke to his AI.

_ “From my scans, it seems to be back in working order.” _

“Cool, let’s try it out…” he trailed off, looking for one of Tony’s higher-tech mannequins to fit the suit on since he currently didn’t feel like putting forth the effort to try it on himself.

He found one of the mannequins, and dragged it over to the lab’s couch, then grabbed his suit, and started to cloth the soulless body, finally pressing the spider emblem to see if it worked.

Thankfully, the suit struck to it’s fitted size, looking quite normal again and he let out a small cheer in victory, only to groan when the eye lenses shut completely.

“Karen? Do you know what happened to the eyes?”

“_ It seems that one of the wires was put in incorrectly when you reattached ‘droney’. However I’m afraid I can’t tell which of the wires is the faulty one, you’ll have to re-open the suit.” _

“Ugh, seriously?” He groaned in frustration. “Hey, Karen? Where’s Mr. Stark?”

“_ He’s stilling waiting for Ms. Potts to arrive,” _ She informed. _ “Would you like me to call him?” _

“Nah, just if he comes back and I’m not here, tell him I went to get something to eat,” he instructed as he grabbed his phone and headphones, leaving for the kitchen, deciding that it would be better to clear his head a bit before continuing his work.

* * *

Wanda had been training with Natasha when Clint came up and asked her if she could go grab the new arrows Tony had been working on for him, and she was more than happy to take a break from sparring, so she agreed.

Tony had given him an access card easier so he could get in, so Wanda had taken it, and was now travelling there. It was a Friday afternoon though, and Stark was usually in there for the majority of Friday, so she knocked first when she arrived, but surprisingly there was no answer. She knocked twice more, but when no one came, she just decided to go in herself.

The lab, as it turns out, was surprisingly empty, but she shrugged it off and walked over to where Tony usually put the Avengers stuff and spent around three minutes trying to figure out which of the four arrow quivers was the one Clint had wanted before giving up and grabbing them all.

She headed out, but something bright red caught her eyes as they glanced over it. She felt her soul try to escape it’s earthly bondage until she realized that the red cloth was Spider-Man just laying on the couch for some reason, his eyes shut.

Getting over her original scare, she smiled lightly as she walked over to the man laying on the couch. She had no idea _ why _ he was in Stark’s lab, or why he was sleeping in here of all places, but she wasn’t about to pass up this opportunity that she’d been granted.

Using her magic, she was easily able to lift the man from the couch and carry him along with her on the way back to the elevator. Surprisingly, he didn’t wake up, but he must’ve been in a really deep sleep since she could hardly feel anything in his mind at all (even though she wasn’t purposely looking, she often could at least still feel _ something _ inside).

She made a quick stop on the Avengers floor to drop Spider-Man off onto the kitchen countertops before heading back down to where the others were training and handed Clint the quivers, smiling softly to herself knowing that whoever walked into the kitchen next was in for a surprise.

* * *

Clint walked into the kitchen after training to just see Spider-Man just _ laying _ on the kitchen counter, as if it were normal, sleeping.

To be fair, he had walked in on the arachnid doing much stranger things before, but it was still pretty damn annoying the have someone sleeping on the countertop rather than the couch, or maybe even a bed- though part of him doubted Spider-Man used a bed- he probably slept in his webbing or something.

He walked towards the man to wake him up, but stopped in his tracks, realizing that for some reason, he’d been given a golden opportunity, and he wasn’t about to waste it.

* * *

Now, what kind of prank could you pull on a sleeping friend?

It was a rather debatable topic since many people had differing ideas of what was funny.

“What’re you doing?”

Clint jumped at the sudden voice and turned to see Natasha scouring the fridge, rather uninterested in what Clint was doing looking over a sleeping Spidey.

“What are _ you _ doing?” Clint asked, turning the question around.

“I asked first, but ok- I’m looking for yogurt, which is usually inside the fridge, hence why I'm looking in the fridge. I see you and Spidey are doing some weird shit, which isn’t unusual, but it still doesn’t explain what exactly it is you’re doing,” she answered, finally locating a yogurt cup, and grabbing a spoon.

“Spider-Man just fell asleep here, and I wanted to prank him…” he admitted, still deep in thought.

Natasha turned and headed out the door, shoving yogurt in her mouth as she headed in the elevator, and yelled out: _ ‘juyt lurn im eepk!’ _Which Sam translated to ‘just turn him pink’, which was a fantastic idea, in his opinion (She was trying to say: ‘just let him sleep’).

The first issue was on how to spray paint him, which turned out to be an easy solution- he just went to one of the many labs in the compound, and asked some of the workers there for a spray paint machine and washable paint (he asked for pink and yellow), which they were happy to oblige, and soon he was once again standing before his sleeping friend, ready to paint him pretty.

Clint had just gotten to work when Sam stepped in.

“Clint, what the _ fuck _-“

“Shhhh,” he hissed at his fellow bird urgently. “Don’t wake him up.”

“You’re painting his suit while he’s asleep?” Sam asked in dull disbelief, leaving Clint to nod, a little less proud than he had previously been a few moments prior.

“And why the hell was I not invited?”

* * *

Sam had joined in, but soon left, only to return with an armful of colourful feathers to put on Spidey after they were done painting, apparently ‘as revenge for that stupid day at the D.O.D.C.’

It _ was _ the Avengers floor though, and it couldn’t last forever just the two of them, and sure enough Steve eventually came along and saw them. Without another word, he left the room, and returned with duct-tape, muttering ‘we’ll see how much he likes being wrapped in this stuff’.

Wanda and Vision casually came through the kitchen and decided that it was pretty entertaining, so they stuck around and watched as the others finished up with Spider-Man.

Just then, they heard footsteps coming towards them- and knowing that the only two remaining people who regularly visited were Rhodey and Tony, there was a small sense of fear that simmered throughout the room consider there was a fifty-percent chance that Tony would find this hilarious and join in, or there was the chance of him getting upset over what they were doing to one of his suits. 

But considering he was currently waiting for Pepper, there was a greater chance of it being Rhodey, and he’d probably just tell them to make sure Tony didn’t find out, before moving on from the room, not even bothering to stop them since he was pretty much broken after spending so much time with them.

Instead, though, the person who came through the doors was none other than Spider-Man’s son.

“Hey, Ned, what’re you doing here?” Wanda welcomed albeit confusedly.

“Hi, um, Mr. Barton invited me?” Ned answered nervously.

“Yeah, I did,” Clint confirmed with a smile. “Spidey usually comes on Fridays, so I thought it’d be a nice surprise for him- though I didn’t think_ this _ would happen…”

“Wha-what do you mean?” Ned asked with concern.

The three surrounding Spidey had the right to look slightly ashamed as they stepped back to show Ned their handiwork.

“Omigod,” Ned breathed.

“Yeah… we might’ve gone overboard…” Steve admitted.

“…”

“…”

“I’ll get the glitter,” Ned volunteered.

* * *

After Peter had finished eating, he went back to the lab to work on his suit, but when he got there, the mannequin was no longer seated on the couch.

“What the fuck?” He wondered aloud to himself, as he scoured the lab with his eyes, still not spotting the mannequin (and to a greater extent, his suit which was also on the mannequin.)

Trying not to freak out, he called out for Karen.

_ "What seems to be the matter, Peter?" _

“Karen, can you track my suit? It's gone.”

“_ Of course Peter, just one moment.” _

Peter tapped his foot impatiently as he waited. It wasn’t possible for someone to so easily break into the lab without him hearing, was it? Then again, he _ had _been wearing his headphones… the ones that Mr. Stark made him… the noise-canceling ones…

_ Shit _ , had he really been that stupid? But even if he _ had _ been wearing them, what were the chances of someone successfully breaking into the compound in broad daylight no less?

“_ Peter, your suit is in the Avengers compound.” _The AI finally answered.

“Oh thank god. So it’s still in the lab somewhere? I can’t see it-“

“_ My readings show that it’s on the floor below you.” _

“Um, what? Oh, it’s on the floor somewhere?” He asked aloud, beginning his search on the floor around the lab.

_ “No, your suit is not on this floor, it’s on the Avengers common floor.” _

_ “ _Shit, this is great,” he stated sarcastically. But there was no way he was about to call Mr. Stark up just so he could pick up his suit for him… and he doubted the whole tablecloth-ghost thing would work again.

Sighing, he went over to his backpack and dug through it, looking for his internship card since Mr. Stark had given him an all-access one in case of emergencies, which in this case would be incredibly useful.

He made sure he at least looked slightly presentable before heading down to the Avengers floor.

* * *

Of all things he had expected to see when he walked into the kitchen, Rhodey had not expected _ this _.

Then again, who would? But then again, he lived with the world’s most powerful collection of strange people, so he really shouldn’t have expected much.

Still though, seeing a group of actual adults along with one teenager crowded around a Spider-Suit which had been painted pink and yellow, covered in duct-tape, glitter and feathers was a pretty strange sight, which was made even stranger when he spotted the actual owner of the suit staring in horror at the scene before him.

“What the fuck is going on?” Rhodey muttered in shock.

“Mr. Stark is going to _ kill _ me,” Peter whispered to himself.

Most of the Avengers looked slightly guilty, but they still mostly looked proud.

“Hey, he decided to take a nap in the kitchen,” Sam defended. “We’re just showing him what happens when he does.”

“Don’t worry, it’ll probably come out,” Wanda assured them. “And if not… then Spider-Man gets a new colour-scheme,” she shrugged.

“Why are you guys even doing?” Rhodey half-sighed, half-asked pressing his hand to his forehead.

“…The answer to that should be obvious,” Clint stated. “The real question is: how much can Spider-Man sleep through? This guy’s like a brick.”

Rhodey looked at Peter through the corner of his eye, the kid still in visible shock, and also visibly _ not _ Spider-Man, which meant that whoever or _ whatever _ was currently in the Spider-Suit, was not, in fact, Spider-Man.

“Oh hey, it’s the intern,” Sam finally noticed. “What’re you doing down here kid?”

“Th-the suit… the spider-suit,” he said in quiet pain.

Clint let out a light laugh. “I don’t think you’ll be able to work on it right now unless we strip him- which might not be the best idea.”

Peter just shook his head and stalked up to where ’Spider-Man’ was currently laying, and before anyone could stop him, he yanked the mask off, revealing… a mannequin.

Immediately the humour in the room died as they all took in the faceless body before them.

“It’s… a mannequin,” Steve unnecessarily narrated.

“It’s what Mr. Stark had me working on,” Peter explained stressfully. “The eyes weren’t opening, it just needed to be rewired… What is it you say about pranking again Ste- Mr. Rogers?”

Despite Rhodey not ever hearing Steve talk about the subject of pranks, his words seemed to affect the good Captian, who bowed his head in apology.

“Shit, we’re so sorry kid,” Sam said as he watched the kid place the mask back on the mannequin. “Don’t worry, we’ll explain it all to Tony- or if you want us to help you fix it-“

“It’s fine, he’s with Ms. Potts right now, I can probably get it fixed before he comes back- thanks though,” he replied, preparing to pick up the mannequin before Rhodey stepped in and grabbed it for him, which Peter gave him a small smile in gratitude.

“Um, I can come too,” Ned spoke up suddenly, causing Rhodey to look at him in surprise… He knew Ned was good with computers, but… 

Sudden horror hit Rhodey as he finally realized something- if Spider-Man was a sixteen-year-old kid, then who the_ fuck _ was Ned? Had the Avengers just adopted a random high-schooler after assuming he was Spider-Man’s son? Why the hell did Peter just go along with it? And why was Ned going so far with this in the first place?

Sure it would be cool to hang out with the Avengers, but why press his luck and keep coming back? And now he was even leaping at the chance to go in Stark’s personal lab, which only a select few could go in… it was suspicious.

The colonel caught the way Peter glared at Ned, so he spoke before either teen could say anything more.

“I’m sure we’ll be fine- thank you for the offer though, Ned.”

“I think it would prove beneficial to have him there,” Vision spoke up. “Ned not only possess knowledge of computers but also of Spider-Man. I’m sure he would prove most helpful in repairing the suit to its proper functions.”

“Yeah, I just, I’m not really sure how Tones would feel about it- there’s a lot of sensitive stuff in his lab.”

“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind,” Wanda assured. “After all, he won’t be alone in there, right?”

The other Avengers seemed to agree with this, and as much as Rhodey wanted to argue, there wasn’t much he could say without dropping one-too-many hints about Peter. 

But on the other hand, having Ned there could be disastrous- would he pretend to know more about the suit and take over Peter’s space? Ned didn’t seem like the sort of kid to do that- in actuality, he seemed pretty nice- but considering the colonel had just realized the true mystery behind the kid, he wasn’t sure of very much anymore.

He also wasn’t sure what Peter’s thoughts on this were since he seemed to be very tongue-tied in front of the other Avengers, which was a very weird thing to see in him considering how hard it was to get 'Spider-Man' to stop talking. But as far as he could tell, Peter wasn’t exactly fond of Ned from the way he had glared at him when he started talking.

Either way, neither of them had a choice in the matter, since before they could say another word, the rest of the Avengers sent the three of them on their way, and they were now headed towards the elevator in awkward silence, Ned not even bothering to introduce himself to Peter.

* * *

Somehow, it felt like the entire timeline Peter had been placed in was hell-bent on placing him in awkward situations.

He hadn’t wanted to interact with the Avengers in the civilian form today, and yet, it had happened. He also hadn’t known that Ned would be there and had no idea how he'd even gotten to the compound, but it turned out to be a welcome surprise since it would be nice to have the extra help in fixing his suit. He _ wasn’t _ glad that Ned had been apart of the group ruining his suit, but he knew more than anyone else how hard it was to say _ ‘no’ _to your childhood heroes.

There _ was _ always the consistent fear of Ned revealing him unintentionally (he thought it was a bit strange that Peter refused to tell the Avengers his secret identity, since they were ‘ _ all in this together _’, and yes, he asked that after they had finished watching ‘High School Musical’ at two am), and sometimes he found himself unnecessarily glaring at Ned in warning, but they were finally able to relax now that they were alone in the elevator with Rhodey, who also knew who he was. It was quite a bit of a relief to have everything slightly normal for once-

“Ned, this is Tony’s intern, Peter,” Rhodey introduced, snapping both Ned and Peter out of their calm daze.

“Huh?” Ned asked in confusion before catching on. “Oh-o_ h. _Um, hi, I’m Ned Leeds… nice to meet you?”

Peter internally swore as it clicked in that he’d never informed Rhodey who Ned was, and never explained what happened with Rhodey to Ned. At least the chance had come to clear the air and get it over with, no more lies-

“Hey, I’m Peter Parker, Mr. Stark’s intern.”

_ Shit. What the fuck Parker. _

He resisted the urge to facepalm as the words left his mouth. Sure his brain was caught up to the fact that Rhodey knew who he was, and thus he didn’t need to lie anymore, but apparently, his mouth was automatically used to lying. He could just speak up now though and clear everything up. He was going to do it.

But as each second ticked by, it became more and more awkward to speak, and the more and more random it would seem. The elevator doors opened, and they walked to Tony’s lab, none of them saying a word.

“Well, here you are,” Rhodey commented as he set the mannequin down on the couch again. “Do you want me to stay and help you?” He asked, subtly gesturing towards Ned.

“No, um, we’re good here, we’ll be careful. Thanks, Mr. Rhodey,” he answered with a tight smile, his mind still buzzing from the new mess he had just created.

“Anytime. Just let me know if you need help, and I’ll come- and I’m pretty sure I told you to drop the whole ‘Mr’ thing a few days after we met, remember?”

“R-right, thanks Rhodey.”

The colonel nodded and gave them a wave before exiting the lab, leaving the two boys alone together.

* * *

After leaving the two kids in the lab, Rhodey had gone back to where the other Avengers were, but he couldn't help but feel overly-concerned about leaving them alone.

He still had no clue who Ned was, and if Peter got caught up in his suit, who's to say Ned won't just leave the lab to take a private tour of Tony's floor?

And it wasn't that he didn't trust Peter to take care of things himself, but it _ was _ easy to get distracted, and he was just a teen...

Rhodey decided he didn't want to take any chances, so he headed back upstairs, walking through the floor hurriedly towards the lab, nearly colliding with Ned.

"Shit, I'm so sorry Mr. Rhodey," the kid fumbled.

"It's ok, I thought you were supposed to be in the lab with Peter though?"

"Yeah, he just asked me to get some drinks," he explained showing the colonel the two cans of pop he was holding.

"That's nice of you, but you really shouldn't be roaming around on this floor alone- it's Tony's personal floor."

"Right... sorry."

"It's fine- let's just get back to the lab, ok?"

Ned nodded and followed Rhodey as he made his way back towards the lab, pushing the doors open and stepping inside.

“Peter?” Rhodey called as he glanced around the lab, Ned right behind him.

“Up here” A voice called from above, causing both Rhodey and Ned to look towards the ceiling where Peter was currently standing upside-down, crouched beside a broken light, apparently attempting to fix it.

To say that seeing him up there was freaking the hell out of Rhodey is an understatement, because _ sure _ , Spider-Man had spent pretty much all his time up there, but that was back when he assumed the suit was doing all the work- but now there was a person- an actual _ fucking human _ \- standing on the ceiling as if gravity just decided to take the day off, casually acting as if ‘ _ yes, this is a normal thing most teenagers have the ability to do _ ’, just a freaking _ teenager _ standing on the _ ceiling. _

So yeah, Rhodey was freaking out. Not nearly as much as Ned though, and suddenly, Rhodey gained the ability to appear unrealistically clam despite freaking out on the inside.

“It looks like you finished those sticking boots huh?” He pretended to ask in genuine interest, hoping it would cover for Peter’s blatant stickiness as the kid in question just looked down at him in confusion as Ned joined in. 

“Y-yeah, Peter worked really hard on those shoes- they’re the ones my dad uses in his suit,” Ned lied quickly.

Rhodey couldn’t believe that this kid just not only lied to his face but also managed to bring up being Spider-Man’s son _ yet again _ , which also in the process took away from the effort that Peter had- _ would have _\- put into those shoes if they weren’t something that Rhodey hadn’t just invented as something to cover for Peter five seconds ago.

“Oh, um, right,” Peter finally responded blankly as he attempted to walk back down the walls casually. “Thanks…”

Just then, Tony walked through the doors.

“Hey, Pete- oh and Rhodes… and Ned? Ok, well, Pepper is jetlagged, so it’s just the… four of us? For dinner I guess…”

“Thanks, Mr. Stark,” Peter finally responded since nobody else seemed like they wanted to respond. “I’m just gonna finish up here, but you guys can go-“

“-I’ll help you,” Tony offered. “Rhodes, do you and Ned wanna go order food?”

“Yes, sure Mr. Stark,” Ned agreed easily, exiting the room, leaving Rhodey to follow.

As soon as the door closed, Tony turned to Peter.

“They don’t know, do they?”

"Hm? About what?"

"They don't know that they both know about your spider-issues, do they?"

“Wha- how did you-“

“-Know?" Tony finished. "Because you never take things the easy way, ever.”

Peter wanted to argue with that logic, but quite honestly, it was the truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!!
> 
> Yooooo next up is an Avengers dinner party, hopefully sometime in the next week???? maybe???? idk I'm tired
> 
> Thank you so so much for all your support, especially on that last chapter, it really meant a lot, thank you<33


	4. *is a banana* "AND IIIIIIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAHHHHHH"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hahaa, no dinner party (lol sorry) but it is slightly more action-y??? I guess????

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it's, uh... it's been a while, huh?
> 
> my bad

Ever since Sam had gone with Spider-Man to the D.O.D.C, something had been off with how he interacted with Spidey, and it was starting to become clear that something had caused distrust in the Spider to sprout again.

Today though, Steve saw just how much Sam’s trust had been displaced.

“What are you watching?” Steve asked as he took in the video that Sam was in deep study of, watching it on his laptop.

“Washington,” Sam explained, though the single world did very little to properly explain it, so he continued. “You know how Spidey got into the D.O.D.C?”

Steve inwardly sighed when he heard the words he had expected to hear. He wished that Sam’s newfound wariness was invalid, but his friend rarely distrusted people if it wasn’t serious.

Still though he couldn’t help but hope that Sam was wrong this one time.

“Sam, I know this is concerning, but you’ve been hung up on this a little too long, don’t you think?” Steve said, sounding as unconvinced as he actually was.

“No, just listen: he _somehow_ broke into the D.O.D.C one night, managed to break out, and was just in time to save a decathlon team more plummeting to their death in the Washington monument- the question is, why would he choose to go to the monument immediately after escaping the facility? Then I decided to look at who he saved.” Sam closed the new report he’d been watching and pulled up a photo.

“Look.”

“Sam-“

“Just look.”

Steve sighed and scanned through the people in the photo- just a few teenagers celebrating a win- when his eye caught on one of the kids in particular. 

“Ned?”

“Yep. I looked it up, and Ned Leeds, A.K.A Spider-Man’s son is on the decathlon team.”

“Well then, that explains what Spider-Man was doing there, which resolves the whole mystery on him, right?” Steve asked hopefully. 

“No, Steve, it was unknown how the elevator blew up, but from these photos, it looks eerily like the alien tech that Spider-Man supposedly ‘stopped’. And out of everyone on the elevator, who do you think had access  _ to _ the weapons? Ned would be the only one, right? What if Spidey set it up using Ned to carry the bomb, that way he could frame himself as the hero, and if anyone managed to find out about his little late-night break-in, his recent success would drown it out.”

“Wouldn’t that make him seem more suspicious? Maybe Ned took it from his dad without knowing- look, this is getting a little out of hand, and we can’t know all the facts unless Spidey tells-“

“Is it getting out of hand, or are you just unwilling to see the truth?”

“…”

“If Spider-Man was innocent, don’t you think he would’ve explained by now?”

“He has a family to protect, never mind his own identity-“

“I call bullshit on his ‘family’. We know who Ned is, we know his wife is named Karen- hell, I could look up his real name easily, but I don’t. He isn’t hiding his identity, he’s hiding his _actions_. And I want to know what it is he’s doing that he wants so desperately hide.”

“…Ok, I’ll admit, it  _ is _ suspicious, but we shouldn’t assume the worst of him,” Steve said, still in defence, although reality was wearing his desire to respect Spider-Man’s privacy.

“I’m not assuming the worst, Steve, I’m only collecting the truth- and so far we know that it's starting to look likely that Spider-Man  _ could’ve _ planned the whole ‘rescue’ in Washington to get the attention of positive press.”

“You’re right, this is all… questionable, and I will admit that everything around him is becoming more…” Steve sighed, not wanting to finish his sentence.

“Look, I like Spidey, he’s fun to be with- but the more we find out about him, the more I realize I don’t know the guy, and the more I realize there’s more than enough reason to doubt his motives. And the thing is, the person who arguably knows the most about his true motives would be Stark, and Tony clearly doesn’t like him- not only that, but he must’ve been pretty desperate when he tried gathering people to fight, so who knows where he found Spidey.”

Steve looked down. Sam was right… there were just too many questions.

* * *

A situation had risen up in Queens, and they had gotten permission from the government to ask for Spider-Man's help regarding the problem, so Tony had called him to come in this afternoon- even though it was almost expected by now to see Spider-Man on Friday afternoons anyway, so there was really nothing different about seeing him there today- even then, he came to compound so frequently (and randomly) that there was really no way of telling when the spider might pop up, so honestly it would hardly be surprising to see him here at three am on a Monday, much less an actual time when he frequently tended to visit.

“Spider-Man, thank you for coming,” Steve greeted, although his voice still reflected his doubts on the man that had re-emerged during his conversation that morning with Sam. If Spider-Man noticed the small difference in tone, it didn’t affect his personality.

“Well, if it isn’t the man with a giant metal frisbee.”

“He’s Captain America to you,” Sam responded jokingly, though slightly defensively.

“Yeah, the man with the giant metal frisbee…”

“Uh, why is there duct tape on your suit?” Clint asked curiously as he and Nat walked into the room.

“Oh yeah, it accidentally got cut, so I just taped it up until I had time to fix it,” he answered, while casually grabbing the glass of water Sam had been holding and taking a sip of it before returning it to its original owner.

“How’d it get cut?” Clint wondered out loud.

“Well, it sorta tore from the knife, but there’s no real damage done to it, so it’s all good.”

“Wait, how did you tear it with a knife?”

Natasha smacked Clint on the head. “How do you  _ think _ he got cut with a knife,  while in his suit no less? It was during a fight, Clint.”

“Yeah, see you’d  _ think _ that,” Clint countered. “But can you ever really be sure with Spidey? I mean, we weren’t expecting him to haunt the compound as a ghost in his spare time, but that was something that happened anyways.”

“That was an accident,” Spidey spoke up in defence.

Clint shrugged. “Just saying, it seems to be a trend that you do weird things.”

“Wow, ok, I’m not going to be offended by that…”

“Sorry man,” Sam joined in. “But I gotta agree with Clint here- you  _ are _ pretty much the strangest on here, and that’s saying something considering we’re probably the weirdest people on the planet.”

“Ok, ok, I get it, you can stop talking about it,” he said raising his hands in defeat. “But anyways, at least this time my answer is normal- Nat was right, there was this mugger guy, and he just whipped out this knife after I pulled the first one out, and I  _ wouldda _ been able to avoid it, but see, it was  _ really  _ bothering me, cuz I knew that there was a really good pun I could say, but I couldn’t think of anything to say other than ‘second knife’s the charm’, but that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, and its not even a pun or anything, like it made no sense, and I knew there was a better joke there, so I was thinking about that, also since I sorta had to say it quickly, otherwise I’d loose my chance to make a joke about it, since obviously saying a joke any later than fifteen seconds after it happened results in bad comedic timing, and its then deemed irrelevant (especially when your in a fight), so I was focusing on that, and I chose to ignore my spider-sense cuz I figured I had time, but it turns out I didn’t really, and by the time I moved, it was too late to make a joke about it, so I just gave up.”

“…And then the guy cut you with his knife?” Sam asked.

“Oh yeah, he definitely cut me, but the victim had some duct tape in her backpack, so she lent me some, which was great, cuz it covered the tear, and it works as a bandage too! It’s the water-proof type, so it stops the blood from coming out as well.”

“Alright, we don’t have time for this,” Tony cut in, grabbing Spider-Man’s shoulder and guiding him to the table beside his seat to which the arachnid obediently sat down as Steve waited for the rest of the group to sit before starting the explanation while Tony removed the duct-tape and began tending to Spider-Man’s wound as if he’d done it already a thousand times while Steve began the report.

“The reason why we were actually allowed invited you to join the mission this time, is because of the information we received, and where it’s based- Queens. And since our last mission in Queens ended up getting hijacked by you, it’ll be more beneficial to have you join us to prevent any unnecessary injuries, and since it’ll be nice to have someone who knows their way around the area.”

“Glad to be of service Cap,” Spidey said happily as he saluted, only to have Tony reach out and pull the spider’s hand down, while Steve attempted to ignore the two of them in favour of continuing the mission report.

“There’s been rumours of high-tech weapon sales rising again in Queens. No one knows where they came from, or who stole the parts to make them, but it’s possible it was the same person who robbed the D.O.D.C a few weeks back- and once again, Spidey is the most knowledgeable on this subject, so…”

Steve looked at Spider-Man, whose eyes were currently widened in excitement. He knew that the truth about Spider-Man was going to come out one way or another, but for right now, trusting him was their best option for the greater endgame.

“So if he tells us something, we need to listen to him and follow his lead so we can minimize any casualties. Understood?”

There were nods of agreement around the table.

“Alright. So I think that it would be best if we were to plan a scouting mission first before any action is taken- just a small group of about four, one of them already being Spidey, of course. Any volunteers for the rest of the group?”

“I need to keep an eye on Underoos,” Tony said almost immediately in a tone that clearly made a_ ‘_ _ _d_o not fuck with me on this _ _’ _point that Steve didn’t want to argue on.

“Alright, so it’s Tony and-“

“I’ll go too,” Sam stated.

“Then I guess I’ll come along,” Rhodey finished, making Steve glad that Spider-Man wouldn’t be left to fend for himself with Sam and Stark, seemingly the two people who trusted him the least.

No arguments were made against these groupings, and soon they were headed towards Queens in one of Tony’s less noticeable cars.

* * *

“Alright,” Tony started as soon as they had parked the car, turning to face Sam and Spider-Man in the back. “I say we split into groups of two- Sam and Rhodes, and me and Spidey. Sound good?”

“No offence Stark, but I think it’d be best if Spidey and I were on the same team,” Sam countered. “I’ll be able to keep watch on the rooftops with him, and you’re suits are much more noticeable than my wings.”

“This is supposed to be a scouting mission though, so in that case, it would be better for Spidey and I to be teamed up since that way he can wear something other than the incredibly attention-attracting suit he has on now.”

“Sam’s right Tones,” Rhodey agreed, earning him a glare from the aforementioned billionaire. “We’ll need to be prepared for any sort of attack, and the two of them would cause the least amount of chaos- plus, this is where Spidey is normally seen, right? There wouldn’t be any sort of suspicion with him roaming around Queens anyways.”

“Then I’ll suit up-“

“Spider-Man can take care of himself, Tony,” the colonel reminded, causing Tony to sigh in defeat.

“Ok, we’ll do it Sam’s way- stay in contact.”

“Sure thing Mr. Stark!” Spider-Man agreed cheerfully. “And, um, thank you Rhodey…”

“No problem Spidey.”

“Alright, let’s head up,” Sam reminded, eager to get the spider alone.

“Right- see you later!” Spider-Man called before jumping out of the car and  _ thwipping _ a web and pulling himself up to the nearest building’s rooftop, leaving Sam to follow his lead.

* * *

Sam was now perched atop an average Queens apartment building alongside Spider-Man, looking over a relatively quiet street. 

He had to admit, that as time went on, it felt strange to be around Spider-Man. There was no doubt that he was hiding something- that was like, the first thing anyone mentioned about the spider, was his ‘secret identity,’ so yeah, it was nothing new that he was hiding something. The real question was: just how  _ much _ was he hiding?

The more time you spent with someone the more you get to know them, right? But not with the arachnid. The more time you spent with him, the more you found out how much you  _ didn’t _ know him, and how much you would probably never know him.

Sam couldn’t deny that he enjoyed spending time with Spidey, but their time together was starting to become tainted behind a web of confusion and uncertainty…

“Hey, y’ see that corner store on that block up ahead?” Spider-Man asked suddenly, cutting into Sam’s thoughts.

“Yeah?”

“They have the best sandwiches in Queens.”

“Good to know… so does a lot of crime usually happen in this area?”

“Ummm, just like, your average amount, I guess? I dunno. Why’re you asking?”

“Because you stationed us here to look for weapons,” Sam answered with slight impatience.

“Oh, right. Well, the first time I came across the weapons, it was in the bank over there, so I figured there might be something… also, I was getting tired from swinging around so much, and this seemed like a good place to stop for a few minutes. It’s also a pretty good place to listen for crimes since this  _ is  _ a pretty busy place,” Spider-Man explained, crossing his legs and looking across the city in what seemed like satisfaction.

“Why are you even doing all of this?” Sam asked suddenly, gesturing towards the city. He wasn’t entirely sure what made him ask that, but it was a valid question. He didn’t want to be an Avenger, he didn’t want the glory that came since he hid his identity… if his intentions  _ weren’t _ bad, then really what  _ were _ his intentions?

Spider-Man turned to look at Sam directly, before looking out towards the city skyline again, his eyes lidded slightly as if he were looking down on the streets in thought.

“I, um… I guess-“ Spider-Man was cut off by the voice of Tony suddenly speaking through their earpieces (or perhaps Spidey’s was just in his mask? Sam wasn’t sure).

_ “We need the two of you here as soon as possible. Fri’s spotted a likely target.” _

“Don’t worry, we’re on our way Mr. Stark,” Spider-Man responded hurriedly, jumping off the roof without glancing behind to see if Sam was following (he was).

* * *

“Where’s Tony?” Sam asked Rhodey as he and Spidey walked up to the man.

“I dunno. He told me to wait here for you guys and he’d be back soon, but it’s been a while now.”

“Did you try calling him?” Spider-Man asked, pulling out his phone.

“Yeah, but he hasn’t responded.”

“You don’t think he’s hurt, do you?” Spidey asked in slight concern even though his eyes widened to show he was much more than ‘slightly concerned’.

“Nah, are you kidding?” Sam responded confidently. “The guy’s just short, he’s easy to lose in a crowd like this.”

“Wait! I might be able to find him- I always wanted to try this,” Spider-Man shared before cupping his hands around his mouth and shouting “SPIDER-MAN SUCKS AND ISN’T AVENGER WORTHY!” Earning the stares of pretty much anyone directly around them, including the Avengers themselves.

“Spidey what the  _ hell _ -“ Sam started, but the spider just held up a hand for silence.

After around forty seconds of silence, Rhodey dared to break it. “What are we waiting for?”

“Um… nothing…”

“So, you gonna let us in on why you yelled that?” Sam prodded, causing Spider-Man to look down, embarrassed.

“I uh, I sorta thought he might show up when I said that,” he admitted.

“Oh  _ god _ ,” Rhodey laughed. 

“That’s the funniest shit ever, I wish I had recorded it,” Sam joined in, laughing.

Just then Tony walked up holding a bagel, along with three small paper bags.

“What’re you laughing at?” He asked casually, taking a bite out of his bagel.

“Spider-Man just-“

“-DON’T, uh, hey Mr. Stark, where were you? We couldn’t find you.”

“I was in that bakery over there,” he explained, tossing a small bag to the spider. “None of us have eaten yet, so I got some for everyone, he said while handing Sam and Rhodey their bags.

“Awesome! Thanks, Mr. Stark,” Spidey said, opening his bag and pulling out his bagel. “Bagel boys,  _ dundundundun, _ boys,  _ dundundundun _ , BAGEL BOYS- WITH CREAM CHEESE.”

Sam watched as Tony completely ignored Spider-Man’s random outburst as if he were immune to any shit the arachnid might randomly do, as Rhodey tried to cover his smile by biting into his bagel as Sam honestly tried to figure out who the fuck Spider-Man really was. 

Sometimes it seemed like he acted too innocent for the stuff he managed to pull off… was it all just an act?

It had to be. After all, what actual person could go from breaking into a secure storage vault, to singing a song about bagels?

(A spider-infused Gen-Z kid could)

Regardless of his initial confusion, Sam decided to follow Tony’s lead and ignore the spider.

“So what’s up? You said Friday found someone with the weapons?”

“Yeah, found someone through a scan. This area’s pretty crowded though, so we couldn’t pinpoint the exact location, but they’re here somewhere. Rhodey and I are going to suit up- you two start searching the area.”

“Right. Come on Spidey,” Sam said, gesturing for the man to follow.

* * *

_“I’ve found him,”_ Tony announced through the coms. _“Converge on my location.”_

The man had taken Tony by surprise, despite appearing like an amateur, the man had a certain skill that made Tony certain there was something more than high-tech weaponry providing the man with fighting power.

Admittedly, the man had gotten one shot in, but it hadn’t done much other than momentarily surprise him, and inform him of the man's arrival, so really, it had been more helpful than hurtful since he was now standing face to face with the man, his repulser aimed while the man stood firm with his alien-gun.

“Gotta tell you, I admire your resolution, but put down the gun. I have a feeling the blast from my suit will hurt you much more than anything your gun’s got. If you put it down nice and easy, I promise they’ll go easy on you in court. Sound like a good deal?”

The man only responded by powering up his gun, causing Tony to sigh, aiming his hand to fire at the weapon to shoot it out of his hand.

He lifted his hand to fire the repulser, but it shorted out, resulting in a few lame sparks.

“Fri? What’s going on?”

_ “Sorry boss, engine failure. I’ve had to reboot the system,”  _ the AI explained in a rushed tone.

He looked up, only to see the fierce glow in front of him, ready to fire. He hardly had any time to move before he saw a flash of red zoom past him, and heard the familiar  _ thwip _ sound as a web shot out and pulled the gun-holder in as Spider-Man delivered a harsh kick to the man, effectively knocking him out.

Spidey stood straight and rushed towards where Tony was still standing. Tony watched the kid approach, fighting back the urge to laugh as he saw the mask’s eyes widen in concern when the kid looked at him- he could only imagine the facial expression behind his mask, as he was Ince again glad that he chose to incorporate the eye mechanisms, if only it served to be entertaining.

“Mr. Stark are you ok?” He asked upon reaching him, hovering awkwardly like he had wanted to hug him, but stopped last second. 

“Yep, all good here- nice work kid,” Tony commended before turning to where the man was lying unconscious, but stopped as he heard as Peter muttered with awe; “I actually saved you.”

He turned back towards the kid and smirked behind the iron (gold platinum alloy) mask.

“Yeah, don’t get a big head because of it- remember all the times I’ve gotten your Spider-Self out of trouble?”

“No like, I saved you- for real this time!”

“What do you mean ‘this time’? You and the team have saved me before- you’ve saved a lot of people kid.”

“Yeah, but this time I did it alone…”

“Just to be clear, I probably would’ve been fine,” Tony reminded him.

“Yeah, just-just let me have this one, ok?”

Tony hid a laugh as Sam and Rhodey landed nearby, and saw the man in front of Tony.

“So, we got him?” Rhodey asked.

“Seems like it.”

“Why is he knocked out?” Sam asked in slight concern.

“That would be due to our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.”

“Ha, yeah, he never saw it coming… I-I mean, I didn’t do it on purpose! I just- I don’t know my own strength sometimes? But I didn’t plan it, I swear.”

“No one’s blaming you Underoos. Comm'n, let’s get this guy back to the compound and see if he’ll tell us anything.”

* * *

Peter was laying on his bed, doing nothing and not particularly feeling like doing anything even though he was pretty restless. He could hear the voices of the Avengers on the floor below him, wishing desperately that he didn’t have enhanced hearing at that moment.

There wasn’t anything that had gone terribly wrong that day, but he was still feeling pretty annoyed, mostly at himself.

It wasn’t like he’d never knocked someone out before (*cough* Steve Rogers *cough*), but this time it felt slightly different for some reason. After Sam had asked him why he was fighting crime, his mind had gone to Ben. It was always Ben’s voice that he heard when he thought about his crime-fighting.

So when he saw that man pointing his gun-thingy at Mr. Stark… 

It was only natural that his mind would go to that fateful night that he replayed in his mind too many times to count, so this time he took the action he wished he had taken when Ben…

Only he had soon realized the reality of the situation as he swung towards the man, remembering to restrain himself the best he could before he impacted the guy. It had still been enough to knock him out, but thankfully there had been no further damage.

He grabbed a pillow and covered his face, relishing the darkness that it brought, hoping that it would black out his rushing thoughts too. But it didn’t.

Then there had been Mr. Stark. He would be lying if he said that he hadn’t started to see his mentor in more of a fatherly way recently. He knew that Mr. Stark would probably never see him that way, but even still, he was grateful for whatever Mr. Stark decided he was to him- hell, even just being seen as his mentee was enough… but when he saw him in danger, he had felt that overwhelming fear inside him that had always been there since his parents died- the fear of losing someone he loved.

That was why he kept his identity hidden, and that was why he went out to protect the city- so he wouldn’t have to feel that sort of fear again… but it had happened anyway…

Just then, he heard footsteps approaching his room, so he threw the pillow back where it had been before, frantic, but tired, debating if he should pretend to be asleep, or if he should grab his phone and pretend to text Ned. Ultimately though, he wasn’t moving quick enough, and the door opened after a quick warning knock.

Peter sat up and turned towards the door, hoping Mr. Stark wouldn’t comment on his apparent lack of doing anything but was instead surprised by the person who entered being Rhodey.

“Hey, I hope it’s ok for me to come in here, but Tony mentioned that you had an increased metabolism, so I brought up some of Cap’s energy bars, and Wanda’s cooking dinner tonight if you wanted to come down and join us when it's ready.”

“Ok... thanks,” he said, still unable to make eye-contact with Rhodey without his mask… he didn’t remember it being this weird when Ned and May found out, but that was probably because they knew him as himself first, and Spider-Man second. Also, it probably had something to do with the fact that he was used to having his face covered up by his mask.

But if he was being awkward, Rhodey didn’t mention it, and instead took his response as an ‘ok’ to continue the conversation.

“I just wanted to say, you did a really good job today- I mean, you're part of the reason why we got the guy so easily,” he laughed.

“Yeah, by knocking him out…”

“Hey, don’t worry, he’s fine- he actually just woke up a few minutes ago- Tony’s interrogating him right now.”

Peter nodded, but couldn’t bring himself to say anything- how could he explain that he was panicked over losing Mr. Stark, and even more panicked that he had started to see him as a sort of father figure? And how could he even explain that to Rhodey?

The colonel, however, picked up that something was wrong, and hesitatingly walked over to his bed, and sat next to him.

“Is everything ok?”

“Yeah…”

“I've been friends with Tony for years, I can tell when something’s wrong… also no offence, but you don’t seem like you’re very good at hiding things.”

“I’m keeping my identity secret,” he pointed out.

“True, though I get the feeling that Tony and I aren’t the only ones who know.”

“Ha... you’d be right about that.”

“I’m sorry about how I reacted when I first found out… I guess I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect.”

“No- no it’s fine, that’s not what’s wrong- I mean, I fine, I’m not mad at you or anything- I just… I’m fine…”

“Hey, it’s ok, you don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to, but I just wanted to say that I’m glad Tony found you. He’s been doing a lot better recently, and I think it’s because of you.”

This caused Peter to look up in confusion, for once forgetting about his unmasked face.

“After the whole accord thing, Tones really wasn’t doing well, but then he started to get better, Pepper came back, and hell, he was even open to having the other Avengers come here again- I just think a lot of it was thanks to you… I’ve seen the way he is with you, he’s happy, and there aren't many people he’s like that with, and I’m just really glad that he has another person he can be so open with.”

“Thanks, um, he’s a really good mentor?” Peter said uncertainly, not entirely sure of what to say in response to that, causing Rhodey to laugh.

“I’m sure he is.”

“My parents died,” Peter stated abruptly, unsure himself as to why he had just shared that, but Rhodey didn’t stop him, so he continued. “My aunt and uncle raised me, and I don’t really remember my parents all that much, so they sorta became like my parents… but then my uncle was killed. I was there, I could’ve- I _ should’ve _ stopped it, but I didn’t… I failed…”

Peter tried to push away that memory, but it wouldn’t go away.

“And I know it’s kinda stupid, but after I lost him, I-I never thought I’d get someone like that again… someone who would want to actually spend time with me and show me stuff, y’ know?”

The words ‘I never thought someone would care again’ went unspoken.

It's hard when you lose a father-figure, or when you never had one. Peter had been lucky enough to have Ben, and some memories of his actual father, but sometimes that made it harder since he had lost them both. 

“And after- after…  _ that _ , I never expected someone else to want me around, to want to be… sort of like how Ben was… especially now that I’m older- no one wants a teenager, we’re only extra work. But Mr. Stark is… he’s ok with me being around, and I didn’t think I’d get another chance to have someone like him… and just- seeing him today, when I arrived, he was already being shot at- and I  _ know _ he would’ve been fine, but just seeing him in a situation like that kinda freaked me out I guess.”

The room went silent as Peter finally finished talking. Was he mortified that he’d just unloaded a bunch of emotional baggage onto Rhodey? Yes. Did he regret it? Also yes, but a part of him felt so much lighter now that he had gotten it all out.

“Well,” Rhodey said, cutting through the peaceful silence. “It sounds like you haven’t had the easiest of lives, huh? And I can’t say I relate to everything you just said, but I definitely can relate to worrying about Tony. But then again, he has Pepper looking out for him, and I don’t think many supervillains are willing to go up against her.”

“True.”

Rhodey put his hand on Peter’s shoulder looking him in the eyes. “I know Tones tends to get in a lot of trouble, but between you and I, Pepper, and the rest of the Avengers, we’ll make sure he’s all right. But you also have to promise you’ll put your safety as a priority too- all of us will get through this together, ok?” Rhodey waited for Peter to nod. “Good. And also, just know that I’m always here if you need anything.”

“Thank you, Rhodey…” Peter said warmly before moving to hug the colonel without thinking it through. He had expected the man to react like Tony had after Germany, but to his surprise, the hug was almost immediately reciprocated once Rhodey realized what was happening.

Maybe it really was for the best that Rhodey found out who he was…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hahaaaa sorry guys, I know I said dinner party, but this one is first, and that ones gonna be the next chapter...
> 
> also sorry this one kinda sucks, but at least it was better than the ones I wrote before it lmao you guys should be glad I didn't post those
> 
> anywaayyyyssssss I know this was slightly more serious, but I actually needed to add to this plot line thingy, so yea- also quick question: would you guys mind if I did a power-loss chapter? I know its a little cliché, but I love those sosososo much... so lemme know!!
> 
> lol and one more sorry for taking so long to write this. I've just been wanting to sleep a lot recently, idk why- like I'm not lazy, I just don't wanna be awake anymore- is that weird? anyway, I'm honestly going to try getting back to posting once a week consistently, so maybe next Thursday?
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!!!


	5. "heeey. hey, hey kids, kids- PATRICIA- honey can you be quiet? I'm just trying to do something

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> um, so we finally sorta get the dinner party? sorta... this is just the first part....

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys so much for all the support!! <3 <3 <3
> 
> So we finally get to the dinner party... or DO WE????
> 
> lol nah we do, but the reason why this took so long is cuz it ended up being a really long chapter, like it's over 7000 words in total, and since my chapters are normally 3500 to 4000 words, I decided to split it into two parts again- I hope that's ok with everyone!! the second part should be uploaded later this week, Thursday being the latest

Peter had decided to stay in his room for a bit longer, still lost in thought from earlier (also slightly embarrassed that he had dumped so much on Rhodey), when Friday suddenly spoke to him, telling him that Mr. Stark had just called a meeting for the Avengers, including him, so he begrudgingly got up, and glanced at his suit which was currently laying on his chair along with his mask.

It’s not that his suit was uncomfortable, but he just really didn’t feel like wearing it at the moment, not to mention that he hadn’t yet properly fixed the tear from earlier. 

Still, though, it wasn’t like he had any other options unless he just wanted to show up in a tee-shirt and jeans, which, admittedly, would draw more attention to himself than it was worth. Also, it probably looked terrible with his mask, so that was out of the question.

But if he was being honest, he would much rather just stay in his hoodie for the meeting- after all, all the other Avengers got to wear what they wanted, so why couldn’t he?

Just as he was about to put his suit on, he realized the perfect solution already existed in his closet, something that he had hidden away, half out of shame, and half because he was saving it for the next time Mr. Stark threatened to take his suit away, though since that day hadn’t come, and he was incredibly tired, he just decided to make practical use of it.

* * *

“Spidey… what the hell are you wearing?” Natasha asked as he walked into the room.

Tony sighed tiredly when he caught sight of what the spider was wearing, as Spider-Man himself looked down at his outfit casually with slight disappointment.

“It’s my suit,” he explained.

“I’m pretty damn sure that’s not your suit,” Sam laughed.

“It is, it was my first one. Well, not my first  _ first _ one, since that one’s pretty much ruined, but it’s similar.”

“ _ That _ , was your first suit?” Steve asked skeptically.

“Yeah.”

“And why, exactly are you wearing it?” Tony asked.

“It’s comfortable, and I’m tired,” he stated firmly before taking a seat next to Rhodey who looked like he was having a hard time figuring out if he was genuinely concerned about the spider, or amused by him.

“Why did you even make another one Pe- for Pete’s sake?” The billionaire questioned.

“If you absolutely must know Mr. Stark, I wanted to have a backup suit incase you took mine away… again...”

“Wait,” Sam interrupted. "He took your suit away? Why?"

"I was at a weapons deal- whatever, we don't need to go into it..."

“So does this one work too? Like, you can climb walls with it and stuff?”

“…Yeah, of course.”

“How does it work?”

“Um… s-stickiness?”

“Alright, we’re getting off track,” Tony interrupted, standing up to begin the meeting. “The guy we caught was unsurprisingly not helpful, but hey, we can’t complain. He did mention that the person he was working for operated in Queens, but other than that I couldn’t get much out of him. The police are coming later to pick him up, but in the meantime, I think we should wait until _whoever-these-people-are_ make the next move. They’ll be on guard now, probably more than before, so we continue monitoring as much as we can, while remaining hidden- this is especially important for Spider-Man since they already know to expect you- so kid, unless you see actual civilians in danger due to these weapons, I want you to stand down and report to us instead, got it?”

“Mr. Stark, I already know how most of these weapons work, so I won't be in that much danger," he argued.

“I know, but it’s best if you wait for them to make a move first, they’re obviously up to something, and if we’re patient and watch, we’ll be able to wait until they slip up and we can catch them… my question is: why are they operating in Queens? Out of everywhere in New York, they choose the one place with an actual superhero frequently roaming the streets… it’s a stupid move if you ask me.”

“It’s not stupid. Not if they have Toomes.”

“Whose Toomes?” Natasha interrupted, causing the intensity between Stark and Spidey to suddenly shatter.

“N-no one. Just someone I know…”

“Didn’t that lady from the D.O.D.C mention something about a Toomes when she was talking to you?” Sam brought up.

“Um, yes,” Spider-Man confirmed stiffly with finger-guns. “Yeah, he- it’s a long story actually, and I’m not sure we should go into it.”

“Since when have you shied away from talking our ears off?” Sam half-joked suspiciously.

“Sam,” Rhodey said in a warning tone, effectively stopping the man from saying anything more, while Tony just eyed Spider-Man in concern.

“Alright, that’s all the information we have for now, everyone’s dismissed,” Tony declared, ending the meeting abruptly.

“That’s it?” Steve asked in surprise. “Don’t you think we should talk a little bit more about this?”

“Yep, but we’ll save that for another day. It’s pretty late, and I’m sure Spidey needs to get home, so I guess we’re gonna leave this meeting as a _’to be continued’_ sort of thing.”

No one argued further with him despite their confusion, since really, who wanted to stay in a meeting any longer than necessary?

* * *

“Wait- Spidey!” Clint called rushing towards him as Peter paused to look down from his perch on the open window where he was about to leap from.

“Did I forget something?” He questioned in doubt. After all, when he came to visit as Spider-Man, he left his backpack on Mr. Stark’s floor, which meant that he hardly carried anything with him other than his phone and what was already apart of his suit, so there was a low chance of him misplacing his web-shooters as he had consistently done with his previous homemade suit (that had happened way more than he was willing to admit). Also he  _ was _ staying the night, so even if he did forget something, it’s not like it’d be a huge deal- then again, Clint didn’t know he was staying over, so it was valid.

“No, I just wanted to talk to you quickly without the others,” he explained.

“Oh, uh ok- what’s up?”

Clint cleared his throat and looked slightly nervous suddenly, even though his resolve to talk was more abundant. “I was wondering- Scott and I do this thing every once in a while where we get our families together and have dinner together, it’s fun for the kids, y’ know? I know Ned’s older than any of our kids, but I still think it might be fun for him- also without needing to hide who his father really is for once, I'm sure he gets stressed about that a lot. Anyways, Scott and I were thinking it’s about time we invited you to join too- we were planning for next Sunday, but-“

“Aw, shoot, I can’t next Sunday, I’m super busy- thanks for the invitation though! I totally would’ve loved to come,” Peter lied- well, it wasn’t a  _ total _ lie… he would’ve wanted to go, since spending time with Clint and Scott along with their families sounded fun, especially since he was probably doing nothing on Sunday anyway- but there was no way he was going to take any more chances after losing his secret identity to two different people last week.  _ In the same week. _

So as much as he wanted to say yes, thankfully he had at least enough common sense to say  _ ‘no’. _

“Aw, ok then- maybe next time?”

“Yeah, um, maybe- thanks Clint, goodnight!” He called as he jumped out the window, before swinging around to the other side of the building and climbing up to Mr. Stark’s floor.

* * *

As far as average weeks went, this one was pretty average- well, as much as it can be when you're a teen superhero. At least there hadn’t been anything to make this week a worse-than-normal week, especially since he was still reeling from the week before with the whole identity-crisis.

He sighed internally as he collapsed into a library chair and pulled out some of his homework for the day. Classes were over, but the decathlon meeting would be soon, so he had decided to just come early. 

He wasn’t here early just because it’d probably make MJ happy. Psssshhhhh that’s ridiculous…

Suddenly his phone buzzed, and he instinctively reached for it, expecting it to be either May, Tony, or Ned- of which it was the latter.

_ Bro, where are u??? _

_ Library for decathlon??? Do we not meet today??? _

_ OH _

_ OH SHIT _

_ PETER I FORGIT TO TELL U _

_ *FORGOT _

_ WE HAVE PLANS _

_ ????  _

_ We do??? _

_ YEA JUST MEET ME AT THE FRONT _

_ Can’t it wait till after?? I don’t wanna miss practice _

_ Lmao when did u become so obsessed w/ decathlon??? Just come meet me _

Peter waited for a second, staring at the texts, debating if it was worth it… but it wasn’t like he hadn’t skipped practice before, right? He finally decided to pack up his stuff again and head to where Ned was. 

He picked up his backpack and slung it over his shoulder as his phone buzzed, once again from Ned asking if he was coming. He was typing out a response as he started to head to the exit, but had only made it five steps before he felt his spider-senses go off, and looked up only to see that he was about to crash into MJ.

Thankfully he had quick reflexes and dodged just in time so they wouldn’t crash into each other. MJ looked at him with slight boredom masking her surprise at his sudden movements as he stood up straight and fumbled to apologize before he turned around again and attempted to head out before MJ could stop him… unfortunately, it was too late for that.

“Where are you going?” She asked him suspiciously.

Peter forced himself to swallow his sigh and turned around. “I’m, I just found out that Ned and I- um, we- well, actually  _ he _ made plans, I didn’t know, but…” He trailed off as MJ just waved for him to go in annoyance, before heading to where the decathlon table was alone, causing Peter to finally breathe in relief despite the guilt he felt from skipping. Why was it so much easier to act suspicious when somebody already suspicious of you?

When Peter got outside, he saw Ned waiting by the school steps looking beyond excited.

“I hope this is important,” he grumbled, still attempting to get over his embarrassment with MJ.

“It is,” Ned assured happily. “Uncle Barton-“

“_Uncle?_” Peter interrupted. 

“He  _ told _ me to call him that.”

“ _ Oh my god _ …”

“You’re just jealous- anyway, Uncle Barton invited us over to his house to meet Mr. Lang and his family! Isn’t that awesome? He said he wanted to introduce me to his kids, so then-“

“Waitwaitwait hold up- your texting buddies with  _ Clint Barton _ ?”

“Yeah, of course- there’s a group chat with all of us too, but he private messages me a lo-“

Peter grabbed Ned’s phone and scrolled through his messages. “You’re in a fucking  _ group chat  _ with the _Avengers_?”

“They were the ones that added me,” Ned defended. “Aren’t you in this one too though?”

“What? No, the only group chat I  have is with Mr. Stark and Happy- I don’t _have_ any of the Avengers numbers!”

“Dude,” Ned laughed. “I never thought I’d have the Avengers number’s before you- I feel so accomplished right now. So anyway, he told me that he invited you to come over last Sunday, but you were busy, and like, I knew you weren’t busy tonight, and I told him tonight would work, so we’re going over now,” Ned finished.

“Ned. Why do you think I told him I was busy on Sunday?”

“Um, don’t you usually spend Sundays with May?”

“Yeah, and cuz I didn’t want to go through an entire fucking meal while pretending to be like, forty years old, which- by the way- would probably lead to someone figuring out my actual age…”

“Ohhh, shit. Sorry, Peter.”

“No, don’t worry, it’s fine- just, Ummm, can you call and cancel? Say something big came up?”

“Dude, you want me to  _ lie _ to an Avenger?”

“You’ve already lied by telling them you’re my son.”

“But that was different!”

“How the hell was that different?”

“Ok fine, I’ll cancel, but the way I see it is that it’s only going to look more suspicious if you keep canceling.”

“What? Nah, he knows I’m a private person.”

“Peter, seriously listen; If you keep canceling he’ll know something’s up- he already knows (or thinks he knows) that you're a father, you spend a considerable amount of time at the compound, plus you’re actually kind of open. If you keep cancelling, when there’s no excuse, then he’s going to know somethings up- he’s a freaking super-spy after all- but if you do this at least once, you keep up the pretence, and there’s less suspicion cast on you. Plus, we don’t have to stay long.”

“Wow… you actually thought this out, huh?”

“I wouldn’t just accept without thinking it through.”

“Just admit it- you like being on Clint’s good side.”

“Who wouldn’t?”

* * *

Peter quickly left to get changed and met up with Ned outside of a Starbucks where Ned and Clint had agreed to meet.

He swung through the streets until he saw where Ned was waiting, and easily landed beside his friend, who hardly even looked up from his phone when he arrived.

“You’re bringing your backpack with you?” Ned asked as Peter pulled his phone out to explain to May where he was going.

“Yeah, I couldn’t just leave it on the streets, and it would’ve taken too long to bring it home.”

“Won’t that look questionable though?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Peter admitted, shrugging the backpack off and tossing it to Ned. “Here, now there’s nothing weird.”

“Because the average student carries around  _ two _ backpacks,” Ned agreed sarcastically.

“I don’t know! Just say you’re holding it for a friend, or like, he knows you go to Midtown, so make some excuse about needing extra supplies.”

Ned gasped dramatically. “I can’t believe you keep suggesting that I  _ lie _ to an actual Avenger, not very good parenting- oh, Mr. Barton says he’s across the street…”

“I see him,” Peter stated,  _ thwipping  _ across the street to where the car was parked, leaving Ned to walk there alone.

“Spidey, hey!” Clint greeted excitedly as Peter jumped into the front seat. “I”m glad you could come. Where’s-“

“Ned’s coming, I just made him walk across the normal way… it’s uh, it’s safer that way. Ha, parenting, amiright?” He joked with a wink, only to immediately want to die from embarrassment. Thankfully though, Ned arrived, and hopped into the car, greeting Clint.

“So, is it just you two?” Clint asked after asking how Ned was.

“Uh, yeah… who else would there be?” Peter asked nervously, feeling as though they had forgotten something important.

“Oh, I thought your wife might be joining us too, I told Ned your whole family was invited…”

“Ah, um, yeah she’s working, sorry,” Peter easily lied.

“Hm, that sucks. Maybe next time then?” Clint suggested, slightly disappointed as he drove off towards the compound.

* * *

“Hey hey hey,” Tony called as he entered to room. “Where are you three off to?”

Clint grinned and threw his arm over Spider-Man’s shoulder, barely noticing how Spider-Man had tensed when Stark came in. “Just headed over to my house for dinner.”

“And what, I’m not invited?” The billionaire said in mock offence, causing Spidey to give a small laugh as Tony pretended (and failed) to ignore how much he loved making the kid laugh.

“Sorry, you have to be apart of the dad-venger’s to be invited,” Clint explained with a smile, obviously excited for Spider-Man to join with the group of two families.

“And what? I don’t classify as a dad?” Tony asked almost offendedly.

“Do you have a kid?”

“He has Peter,” Ned volunteered with a laugh, earning a smack from Spidey as Clint asked, “Who the fuck is Peter?”

The three were quiet in response as Clint looked from person to person, each one equally avoiding eye contact (other than Spider-Man, but who even knew where the fuck he was actually looking with those giant white eyes).

“Who’s Peter?” Clint asked again, hoping for at least a resemblance of an answer, which he luckily received from Spider-Man, who sighed, and grasped his arms.

“I guess it’s time you finally knew the truth, Clint,” he admitted in a low tone.

“The truth?”

“Yeah, see- the thing is… I- Peter is…”

“It’s ok, you don’t-“ Stark started, but Spidey just held up his hand for silence.

“It-it’s ok Mr. Stark, I’m done living this lie.” Spider-Man turned to face Clint, staring him in the eyes. 

“Clint, I have a dog, and his name is Peter. Mr. Stark loves that dog with his life and comes to visit him regularly at my house so often that it’s turned into a running joke between us- congrats, you’re now apart of the group that knows I have a dog. Can we go now though? I’m starting to get hungry.”

“Don’t worry Spidey, your secret’s safe with me,” Clint laughed before throwing his arm around Spidey again, leading him into the ship as they both yelled ‘bye’ to Tony, leaving the billionaire and Ned together in shock.

“Just to be clear, you thought he was going to reveal himself too, right?” Ned asked skeptically, as Tony only nodded in conferment.

* * *

“I’m really glad you could both make it,” Clint mentioned again as they stepped off the plane. A little ways away, Peter caught sight of a farmhouse, along with a barn off to the side.

He had to admit, it was a little weird to see that one of the Avengers had a normal life outside the usual action and excitement that was felt at the compound, and he felt strangely sad that there had been another side to Clint that he hadn’t seen before, though he realized that he was doing the same but to a greater extent with the others… At this point, he wasn’t even sure what he would say to them, or what they would say to him if they found out…

“Wow, it’s so peaceful out here,” Ned commented as they stepped onto the porch.

“Yeah, that’s one of the things I like the most about this place- though I will admit, it’s a little inconvenient to be pretty much in the middle of nowhere.”

Clint rapped on the door once in greeting, before stepping on through the door, gesturing for the two teens to follow him inside.

“I’m excited for you to meet Lila, Cooper, and Nate,” Clint mentioned to Ned. “I was hoping that you might be able to babysit them- y’ know, if you ever need to make some extra money or something, it would work out great for everyone since then Laura and I could get a break.”

“What about me?” Peter asked, only half-jokingly.

“Aren’t you supposed to already have a job?” Clint asked.

“Ye-yeah, but I could use some extra money too!”

“I’m pretty sure Mr. Stark would start giving you an allowance if you just asked,” Ned added.

“Shut up Ned.”

“_Spider-Man_, I cannot believe you just spoke to your son like that,” Clint said in fake aghast.

“Yeah dad, why are you so mean?”

“Excuse me? I’m an in-spidering father Ned.”

“Not with your sucky puns you’re not,” Ned commented as Clint laughed.

“No, don’t you see Ned? That what makes him a great dad,” Clint stated as Scott walked up.

“Hey Spidey, I’m glad to see my bug-buddy again,” he said happily giving him a high-five in greeting before turning his attention to Ned. “Who's this? A friend of yours?”

“Oh yeah, um Scott, this is Ned Leeds,” Peter introduced.

“Nice to meet you Ant-Man, sir,” Ned said nervously.

“Woah… you actually know who I am?”

“Yeah, of course! I’ve heard so much about you!”

“It looks like they hit it off pretty well,” Clint said to Peter as they watched Scott and Ned excitedly talk to each other. “Come on, lemme introduce you to Laura.” 

Clint guided Peter away from Ned and towards the kitchen towards where two women were standing- Hope, and assumably Laura was the other person.

“It’s nice to see you again Spider-Man,” Hope said warmly.

“Yeah, you too,” Peter said in return. He had only met her briefly a few times, but she had always seemed to be friendly.

“And I don’t believe we’ve met- I’m Laura- it’s nice to finally meet you, Clint’s told me a lot,” she stated with a hint of laughter in her voice.

“Ha… um, wh-what did he say about me?”

“Don’t worry, it was all good things… like Ned, he says you raised him right,” she complimented, which just resulted in Peter laughing awkwardly again.

“I didn’t know you had a son,” Hope mentioned. 

“Yep… he’s over there talking with Scott…”

“If I’m being honest, I was assuming you were the youngest out of us all,” she laughed. “Not that it’s a bad thing, but you come across kinda youthful…”

“Yeah, I get that a lot…” replied the teenager. At least  _ that _ wasn’t a lie…

And something told him that honesty was not something that was about to come in handy tonight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed!! I'll see you all soon for the next part!!
> 
> sorta unrelated, but it's Ace/Aro/Demi/Grey awareness week!! I didn't actually know that it existed until a few weeks ago, but yea!! Thank you to everyone who supports us, it really means a lot! <3
> 
> kind of random question: do any of you re-read this series? I'm just sorta curious cuz I wanna know how much I can mention previous chapters w/o out confusing people (hell, I don't remember half of the shit I've written)
> 
> Thanks for reading!!! <33


	6. they ask you how u are and u just have to say that ur fine, but ur not fine-

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is just a re-upload of chapter 6, I just re-wrote that one part people were complaining about, it just took long cuz I really didn’t wanna do it lol. Anywaysss, there will be an actual new chapter coming tomorrow morning) so don’t worry, I’m not out here to prank ya’ll- but there are a few people who weren’t here when it was first posted, so I just wanna make sure they see it too!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again!
> 
> Thank you for your patience and support during the wait! There's a new chapter coming tomorrow

“Alright, time to eat!” Scott called from where he was helping Clint set the tables. “There’s not enough space for all of us though, so we’re going to have to split up. Now I say we draw lots or something, maybe play charades to see who goes where?”

Laura smiled at Scott’s suggestions. “Or maybe instead we can just separate the kids and adults? If they don’t mind- Ned, you’ll be the oldest, is that ok?”

“Oh, of course, Mrs. Barton, I’m just happy to be here,” Ned said gratefully as Peter looked on in dread. He had at least had the comfort of knowing that Ned was there with him, but now apparently he wouldn’t even have that. How the hell was he supposed to get through an entire dinner with a bunch of functioning adults? 

“But then what about Spidey?” Scott asked confusedly.

“I’m sure he won’t mind being separated from Ned,” Hope reminded him. “Right Spider-Man?”

“Huh? Yeah, of course- I mean, of course, I don’t mind.”

But he did mind. Very much.

The closest he had ever come to a situation like this is when he had dinner with the Avengers, but that was usually just casual- there was something about being at someone else’s house that made it seem so much more personal, and official… and so so much worse.

Of course, he’d been over to the homes of May and Ben’s friends, but those were people who he grew up with visiting, and, oh yeah, he wasn’t attempting to pass off as an actual adult with them.

Still, though, it wasn’t like he could argue with sitting at the adult table since that would be rude, and if there was anything he had learned from dinner parties with May and Ben, it was to be respectful… though he wasn’t entirely sure how adults were supposed to be around each other- or what the hell they were even supposed to talk about.

Peter went to go sit beside Scott, but Clint stopped him. 

“It’s your first time, and you came alone, so you get the honour of sitting at the head of the table,” Clint announced.

“Wha- um, n-no it’s ok, I mean thank you, but-“

“You don’t really have a choice since you came alone,” Hope said flatly.

“Oh, right, sorry- thanks, I’ll just sit,” he said, quietly making his way to his seat, feeling more awkward then ever- and this was coming from a guy who showed up to a dinner party in red and blue spandex.

“Spider-Man, is there anything I can get you to drink? “ Laura asked. “We have Corona’s, Budweiser-”

“I-I can’t drink.”

“Oh, ok, is there anything else-“

“It’s because I’m expecting,” he blurted out, and immediately wanted to kill himself. This whole time he’d been expecting to meet resistance- after all, in every movie he watched, the characters had always been mocked for not drinking, so he was looking for an adult-sounding excuse to use, but he hadn’t driven there, so that was the only thing he had thought of in time.

Until he remembered that it was pretty unlikely for him to be expecting.

Apparently, the rest of the table thought this too, since everyone had been brought to a stunned silence.

“Boy or girl?” Hope asked casually, taking a sip from her glass.

“Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhm. I’m  _ expecting a package _ … it-it’s a chainsaw… and the instructions say you shouldn’t use one if you’ve had alcohol,” he explained, his voice getting quieter with each word, desperately hoping no one here had read an instruction pamphlet for a chainsaw since he sure as hell didn’t. He was also hoping that no one would question why he had read the instructions for the chainsaw before it had even arrived.

An awkward silence fell upon the table as the others took in this new information with skepticism.

“So,” Clint finally started after a long silence. “You’re going to go home… and you’re going to go open the chainsaw you bought, and… cut stuff with it?”

“Yep,” Peter replied, popping the ‘P’. “I-I like wood-carving.”

“It’s past seven already though,” Clint stated.

“And don’t you live in the middle of Queens?” Scott asked in concern. “Won’t that be loud?”

“Well, yeah, of course- um, I guess I’ll just take it outside?”

“Call me crazy, but I don’t think the police will be fans of someone running down the streets with a chainsaw this late at night,” Hope commented.

“Well, he  _ is _ going to be carving wood,” Laura said in an attempted case of defence although she looked the most concerned.

“Ok fine,” Spidey said in defeat, holding up his hands. “I’ll just go in the woods or something so I don’t freak anyone out.”

“…”

“…”

“Spider-Man, I’m pretty sure that’s much worse.”

“Ye-yeah…. Yeah, I realize that…”

* * *

Peter had been successfully avoiding conversation for a while now, and he was starting to become slightly more comfortable. He still felt incredibly self-conscious about wearing a super-suit, and he was honestly wishing that he had gone with a more subtle colour scheme. 

He got the feeling that they were avoiding asking him questions after the last time he had spoken ended up… rather weirdly, so he honestly didn’t mind just sitting and being quiet.

He  _ was _ , however, slightly jealous of Ned, who currently seemed like he was having fun with the kids, but whatever, these were his choices, and now he had to live with them. He was thinking about how random it would be to reveal himself right now like it’d probably cause some drama, but mostly it would be weird cuz then everyone would have to figure out what table he was supposed to sit at.

Slightly, bored he decided to listen to the conversation Ned was having with the other kids- it was actually really cute, mainly about Star Wars- when Clint waved his hand in front of his face to gain his attention.

“Hm- what?” He asked, snapping back to reality, slightly embarrassed that he had allowed himself to become distracted.

“Are you falling asleep on us Spidey?” Clint asked jokingly.

“S-sorry, I was just thinking about something, sorry… What were you saying?”

“Nah, we were just talking about our Prom’s,” Hope explained causing Peter’s mouth to go dry at the mention of a school dance.

“O-oh?”

“I still think I had it the worst,” Laura stated flatly. “But I was apart of the marching band, so I suppose I had it coming,” she admitted as she joined in with the laughter around the table, leaving Peter absolutely clueless, dwindling on the dreaded line of: should I ask what happened? Or continue laughing along with everyone like an idiot? Finally deciding to go with the latter since he could’ve just avoided this situation had he been paying attention.

“What about you Spidey?” Scott asked suddenly.

“I’m sorry?”

“How’re school dances going for you?”

“Oh, I’ve never really been to one,” he lied, cursing the way his voice pitched at the end.

“Aw, you don’t even have one embarrassing high school story to share with us?” Clint said jokingly as if Peter wasn’t about to go and live embarrassing high school stories the next week.

_ Cuz it’s all in the past. _

“Um, This one time I stole this kid’s car…” Peter admitted, his mind still on homecoming. “He was kind of a jerk though, but I guess we get along better now…”

There was nothing but uncomfortable questions hanging around the table as they all stared at the Spider.

“You stole a car?” Laura asked uncertainly as if she hadn’t heard him right.

“Ha. Um, yeah… it was an emergency though. Oh! There was this one time I got detention for wrecking a bunch of lockers, that was kinda funny in hindsight.”

“Were you a rebel kid?” Clint asked in confusion. “Honestly I thought you would’ve been some sort of nerd.”

“I ammm- not. A rebel. Anymore. I was never one actually, it was my best friend’s idea to wreck those lockers- and I probably would’ve just been rolling around on a school bus floor instead of stealing a car if it hadn’t been for him, so, y’ know, who's really the rebel out of the two of us?”

“You’re parents didn’t stop you from hanging out with him?” Hope asked.

“Nope, they didn’t say a word about it.”

“I wonder where this guy is now,” Clint scoffed.

_ In your own fucking house. _ Peter thought exasperatedly.

* * *

Peter had decided to excuse himself from the table so he could go take a breather outside for a few minutes. He was making everything so much worse then he needed to, and was desperately wishing that Tony, Rhodey, May, or hell, even  _ Happy _ was there… it would’ve gone so much smoother.

His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the door opening, and someone else stepping onto the porch with him. He turned around, hoping desperately that it was Ned, but it turned out to be Scott instead.

“Hey,” Scott greeted uncertainly.

“Hi…”

“Um, Spider-Man, can I ask you something?” Scott said abruptly.

“Yeah sure, of course. What’s up?”

“I’m not entirely sure how to phrase this… hm. Ok, so basically, do your parents let you drink?”

Peter nearly choked despite not currently drinking or eating anything. He stared at Scott, looking for any amount of proof that he was joking, the man was seemingly entirely serious.

“Well, we’ve never really had that discussion,” he answered truthfully. “And now I highly doubt we ever will. I mean, if I did talk to my parents, I don’t really think that they’d bring it up, it would just be kind of a weird thing for them to mention in that sort of situation, so yeah…” He did sorta doubt if he managed to talk to his parents from beyond the grave that they would give him drinking advice.

“Ok… huh, ok, so that maybe wasn’t the best way of phrasing that, but I’m just wondering- I mean, everyone’s treating you sort of strangely, like making jokes and stuff, but… sorry, I really don’t know how to ask this, it’s just, I get the feeling something is wrong here, but for some reason, I’m the only one getting this. I thought you were underage for drinking, is what I mean, and I’m usually fine with that, and so is Clint, but it’s just that Laura is usually really careful, but you said this is your first time meeting her, and-“

“Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh,” Peter said loudly in lack of a better response. “Um. Ha, I’m s-sorry, what did you say?” Peter gasped, barely able to comprehend what he just heard.

“Laura’s usually really careful with alcohol- I mean, she didn’t let Ned have any-“

“Nonono- not that- wh-what did you mean that I’m ‘underage’?”

Now it was Scott’s turn to be confused.

“But- Stark calls you ‘kid’ all the time, also you’re clearly a teenager. And isn’t Ned your friend? You came with him?”

Peter was silent. Mostly due to not knowing how the  _ fuck _ he was supposed to respond to that. Was he supposed to deny it? To confirm it? To get on his knees and beg him not to tell?  _ What the fuck was he supposed to do? _

“How. Even… what? I-I don’t know what your talking abo- I mean, those are just speculations, right? Y-you were just guessing…”

“Guessing? Ok, I’m going to admit, I’m kinda confused right now.”

“Ye-yeah, you and me both. Hey, um, can we go somewhere more private to talk for a second?” Peter asked, but without waiting for an answer, he made his way to who-knows-where, as long as it was out of sight from the house.

Scott followed him as he walked behind a clump of trees blocking the view of Clint’s house, and far enough away that it was out of earshot for a normal human being.

“Is everything alright?” Scott asking in genuine concern after they had stood in silence for a few seconds.

“Um, yeah- no- I honestly have no fucking clue- uhhh, ok look, how much exactly, do you know about me?”

“Not much, we haven’t really spent time together, but I do know you quote vines a lot- Cassie makes me watch them, so I can recognize them pretty easily now. I know you’re in a super-smart high school, since Tony hired you as his intern and was bragging about you, which was actually really sweet, I didn’t think he had that sort of side in him. Also, I know that you blacked out and pretended to be a ghost when we first met, but I’m a little unclear if that’s a normal thing for you or not.”

“Yeah, I don’t normally do that…”

“That’s what I was assuming, but I didn’t want to leave it out. I also know that your Spider-Man, but that’s pretty much a given, right?”

“Pretty much, yeah…”

The two stood awkwardly facing each other for what seemed like an unbearable amount of time until Scott finally spoke again.

“Hey, so, I’m glad I got to talk to you alone, I’ve been having this problem with my ants, and I think you might be able to help.”

“O-oh? T-that’s pretty cool, I’m not really an expert on ants though, but what’s the problem?”

“No, the ants aren’t doing anything wrong, and that’s just it- they’ve done nothing wrong, and yet  _ your _ friends keep killing them,” Scott explained in a slightly mournful tone, although he was leaving Peter behind, completely confused.

“I’m sorry-  _ what? _ ”

“The- your spiders! They keep killing my ants, can you tell them to knock it off or something? Do you know how much it hurts when they die? They become my friends, and I know you understand with the spiders too, but it just- it hurts when they die…”

“Dude… I’m sorry, but I can’t control spiders… They- they don’t listen to me.”

“But your  _ Spider _ -Man?”

“Yeah… but that’s just cuz I’m sticky and can shoot webs…”

“Oh…”

“I- um, I hear lavender is a good spider-repellent though.”

“Oh yeah? I’ll have to give it a try.”

They stood in silence after that, the only sounds interrupting them being the crickets chirping in the distance, as the moonlight provided them with a gentle glow so they could at least make out their surroundings.

Peter was still unsure what he should do. At this point, denying it seemed weak, and there was nothing left to explain since Scott didn’t seem to have a problem with any of it.

“Ok, wait- so you actually know who I am?” He finally asked.

“Yeah, of course- we’re bug-buddies after all! Did you really think I'd forget you?”

“No it’s just, um, ok wait,” Peter said, finally taking off his mask since there wasn’t any point to keep it on. “You aren’t supposed to know who I am,” He explained flatly.

“What? But we met way back in Germany-“

“Nononono, not that, I mean you aren’t supposed to know my name or my age, or literally anything that you just mentioned…”

“Oh…”

“It’s nothing personal!” Peter said hurriedly. “It’s just-  _ no one’s _ supposed to know, not even the other Avengers know… the only people who know are Mr. Stark, Rhodey, Happy, Ned, and my Aunt… and  _ possibly _ Ms. Pepper, I’m not entirely sure… oh, and Liz’s dad, but I-I don’t like to think about that. Also, MJ sorta watches me a lot, but I’m not sure if that’s cuz she thinks I’m suspicious, or if she might actually- y’ know what, never mind…”

“God, I am  _ so _ sorry, I thought everyone knew,” Scott explained, still in shock. 

“Yeah, um, I’m honestly surprised no one else figured it out by now…” Peter admitted. “But, if-if you could just… not mention it to anyone, if that’s ok…”

“Yes, absolutely, but, just out of curiosity: how old do they think you are?”

“Late thirties. Actually, I’m pretty sure Sam thinks I’m in my forties… oh, and they all think Ned’s my son for some reason- don’t ask.”

“I’m honestly not sure how to respond to any of that.”

“Yeah, it’s been a while, and even  _ I _ don’t know what the fuck to do with it.”

Just then, Peter heard the house door open, and quickly pulled his mask back on as Clint called for them.

The two of them stepped out from behind the trees and headed to where Clint was.

“There you guys are. What, are you having secret meetings without me? And at my own home too? I’m hurt,” he said in mock offence.

“Nah, I just had a question about spiders,” Scott answered truthfully.

* * *

Since Scott was already planning on going back to New York to check on Pym’s lab in New York, he offered to fly the two teens back with him, which Peter and Ned gratefully accepted, as they were both broke high schoolers, and a normal flight wouldn’t have been nearly as comfortable.

Scott assured them that they could crash in the back, which they gladly did, able to get in a quick nap before arriving back at the compound, where Tony met them on arrival.

“Thank you for flying us back Mr. Lang,” Peter said tiredly as they stepped off the plane.

“It was no problem, I was headed over here anyway,” he assured him. “I  _ am _ pretty beat though- I’ll see you both later?”

Both of the teens nodded in response.

“Great, it was nice to meet you, Ned- oh! And I almost forgot…” Scott said, rummaging through his pockets until he brought out a small card and handed it to Peter. “It’s my phone number- if you ever need any help just let me know.”

“Thanks, I will,” Peter said genuinely before Scott waved ‘goodnight’ to them and Tony as the billionaire walked over to the two boys. 

“Did you have a good time with Clint?”

“Um, yeah, it was pretty fun,” Peter admitted as Ned nodded vigorously.

“Are you two staying the night? Does May know you’re here?”

“Yeah, she knows, but we need to go back- we have school tomorrow.”

“I can’t believe you’re rejecting me for school again,” Tony said in fake shock. “Actually, I believe it. Happy’s already asleep, so I’ll drive you back.”

“Oh… it’s ok Mr. Stark, Ned and I can call an Uber or something-“

“You’d rather pay to have a stranger drive you home than have me drive you for free?”

“We don’t want to inconvenience you-“

“I’ll already be up for a few more hours, I might as well hear what happens at these dad-vengers meetings- that name is  _ so _ cringy, by the way, how does he even say that without wanting to die a little?”

“You should really try to sleep more,” Peter yawned, not sounding convincing in his tired state.

“Wow, just one dinner with Clint and Scott and you’re already sounding more like a father. Is that what you guys do? Just go around the table sharing dad tips?”

Tony, however, was never to hear what happened that night, since pretty much as soon as he started driving, both Peter and Ned fell fast asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> press f to pay respects at peter once again losing his identity
> 
> Thanks for reading! 
> 
> I especially wanted to say a huge thank you to Aziraphalessushi. She’s fucking awesome guys (go read her stuff)! Everything kinda went to shit recently, and I ended up in the hospital, but a few days later she invited me to colab with her on a fic, and has been super patient with my slow responses, and she’s just overall a really great person, and really helped me to keep on writing, she’s honestly the reason why I’m still feeling ok to do this!! She's also a really great writer!
> 
> Anyways, the fic we colabed is up now if anyone wants to check it out- it’s a lil bit dark, but it’s a hydra!Peter fic if anyone Ikes those!!


	7. "Gurl ur thicker than a bowl of oatmeal"    *fingerguns*

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> who would’ve guessed I’d write another chapter with sleep deprived Peter? Sorry ya’ll but it’s my favourite way to write him cuz lacking sleep and doing weird shit is how I live everydayyyy
> 
> Anyways lets gooooo cowabunga ya’ll

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all your support!! you guys are awesome, and I hope you enjoy this next chapter ima go ahead and sleep now...
> 
> love ya'll<33

Peter couldn’t sleep.

It wasn't usual for him to not be able to sleep after having to stay awake for a long period of time, so after pulling many, many, late nights in preparation for exams, he found himself unable to sleep now that it was finally all over and he was allowed to sleep.

It was only three in the morning right now, but Peter found himself fidgeting, so he finally caved and texted Ned, who, unsurprisingly, didn’t respond. Next, he tried MJ, then Betty- heck, he almost tried Flash, but he finally decided to settle on scrolling through Instagram for a while instead. Then twitter. Then he went on Club Penguin for a bit, but he still found himself restless and bored.

He took a quick glance out the window, longing to be out on the streets swinging, until he saw that it was snowing, which sucked since it got pretty cold slugging through the snow as Spider-Man, but then again, a lot more people ending up slipping when they were trying to escape, so it’s not like the criminals had a great time with it either.

But even despite all that, he still felt the urge to get out of bed, and web through the streets- at least that way he wouldn’t be feeling so frustrated with himself, and he’d be frustrating the criminals of Queens in return- It was like he’d be handing off his frustration! A sort of win-lose situation.

But he also knew that the moment he put the suit on and went more than a block away, Tony and May would be notified, and he’d just have to face two people yelling at him aside from his current internal screams, so that didn’t sound like much fun either.

He sighed and leaned back in bed. Mr. Stark was probably still awake, so he could text him… there was nothing like having Iron Man as your texting buddy- though if he was being honest, it’d be pretty great to have the other Avengers to text as well. Cap probably texted like an old man- or at least that’s what Ned had mentioned.

_ Why does Ned get to be in the Avengers chat anyways?? _ He wondered, only slightly bitter. _ I mean, I’m an actual freakin superhero, but Ned still got their numbers before I ever did. What the hell. _

And of course, he didn’t hold that fact against Ned- why would he? It was just slightly annoying that Ned managed to get their numbers without powers… And meanwhile, he was hanging out over here _with _powers and he still didn't have their numbers (even if it was all technically to keep his identity safe).

How hard was it for a guy to get his childhood hero's phone number’s for crying out loud? But they did sorta like Spider-Man as their friend, but he couldn’t get their numbers as Spidey, so he had to do something else… get something like Ned had- a different identity- like a fursona, but a human.

The only thing was that Spider-Man was his fursona, and he didn’t know how to get a human version of that.

Oh.

_ Oh. _

_ That’s disappointing. _

And it was. There truly is nothing more disappointing than realizing that you are a disappointing human being, so disappointing that you forgot you existed, and that your heroes know who you are, and have known you for a while as yourself, and yet you still don’t have their phone numbers.

The second most disappointing thing is realizing that your life-long dream of becoming a superhero has come true, but the cost of becoming one was meaning that you officially created a fursona for yourself.

When you never even thought you were a furry in the first place.

“Omigod,” Peter said breathlessly as this realization hit him. “Am I a furry?”

* * *

Four. Four in the fucking morning and someone had the guts to call him.

And that someone was the kid of all people.

To be fair, Happy wouldn’t have been this pissed if it turned out Peter had been captured, or hurt- well, he would be pissed still, but not at Peter, only at the people who harmed the kid.

Nor would he have been angry if Peter had come across some huge crime syndicate that needed stopping. Sure the kid would’ve been out way past his bedtime, but he felt almost proud when he saw how much good Peter managed to accomplish.

But none of that was the point right now- the point was: when Happy was woken up by his phone ringing at fucking four am, the last thing you might want to say is the very thing that Peter asked.

“HAPPY I NEED A SECOND OPINION BUT NED IS ASLEEP AND I DON’T KNOW IF SPIDER-MAN IS TECHNICALLY MY FURSONA OR NOT?!?”

Happy felt as though he had to review his entire life when he heard the sound of a sixteen-year-old kid screeching this at him. What life choices had led him down this path? How had he done the exact things needed in life to get a kid to yell at him about… fursonas? Whatever that was? At four am? What could he have done to prevent this in life?

Alas, the universe was preventing answers from being found, and he felt himself being pulled back inside his body, back to reality, and back to a sixteen-year-old’s early morning crisis.

Ignoring whatever the hell it was that Peter was screaming about, Happy instead got on the more pressing issue at hand.

“Why are you still awake kid?”

“Oh. Um… I’m just finding it hard to sleep right now.”

“Mhm. And why can I hear traffic outside? I doubt you're keeping your window open.”

“Okokok, fine, I’m outside, but it’s just my apartment roof! I didn’t wanna wake May up.”

“Right,” Happy sighed as he put his phone on speaker and went to his ‘Peter app’ as he liked to call it since that’s what the primary use of it was.

“Honestly- I haven’t left my rooftop.”

Sure enough, the spider-symbol representing the kid’s whereabouts remained on his apartment building, though it also revealed that the suit had been activated.

“Care to explain why you suited up for a rooftop phone call then?”

“My suit has a heater in it- you didn’t actually expect me to lug my space heater all the way up on the freakin roof this early, did you? I don't even know if there's a power outlet up here.”

“I didn’t expect you to be on the roof this early in general,” Happy stated flatly.

“Yeah fair point.”

“Kid. Go to sleep.”

“Yeah, I’d do that, only I can’t right now. Adventure awaits and I’m the bread that life gets. I’m real wheat.”

“Peter, I swear, if you don’t go to sleep now, I’ll get Tony.”

“Your threats are meaningless since Mr. Stark, the tin can man ain’t even picking up my calls.”

Happy pressed his hand to his temples. He was now already wide-awake, and worst of all, Peter was right- Tony was currently unavailable, and May was getting some well-deserved rest, and there was no way this phone call was about to end anytime soon- unless Peter made some really bad choices and went on a rampage through New York. And in the state Peter was currently in, Happy doubted the Daily Bugle would be kind when they published about the Spider’s early morning dealings, and the next thing you know, suddenly Spider-Man is the leader of a crime syndicate. 

No, he had to keep tabs on the kid, and not just through a phone call. 

The man sighed as he realized what he was about to do.

“Peter, stay where you are, I’m coming to get you.”

* * *

It was six, and, Clint, Rhodey, and Tony had just gone to sleep after staying awake all night interrogating the man they had caught, but nothing had come of it. The FBI were taking him away at nine’ o'clock sharp, and the Avengers wanted to take one last go at him- which would’ve been a lot easier had Wanda been there, but she had gone to Sokovia to commemorate her parent's deaths along with Vision, and no one was about to interrupt that.

Now the final shift was left to Sam, Natasha, and Steve, and they were determined to get him to talk.

The compound was still relatively quiet as the three sat outside the interrogation room with mugs of coffee, watching the man inside as Nat went over the info and breaking points Clint had gathered- it was quite a bit, but not nearly enough info yet.

Natasha sighed as she realized the next few hours would be long and dull, but they had to know where these weapons were coming from.

“Alright, I’m up first,” she decided, the others nodding in acknowledgment as the spy walked into the room.

Sam and Steve remained silent for a bit as they took in Nat’s questions and methods until finally, Sam broke the silence between them.

“I don’t like this,” he announced.

“None of us like doing this either Sam.”

“No, not that. I mean this whole situation seems sketchy- this guy was just a weapons dealer, and we haven’t had many problems with them before, not like this guy. They usually freak out when they see us, try to do whatever they can to talk their way out of it, but this guy hasn’t even flinched. It’s like he’s not afraid of us.”

“Maybe he isn’t. We are the Avengers, he knows we won’t torture him.”

“Yeah, but even then, they usually squirm when they're faced by the world’s ‘greatest heroes’ or whatever we’re called these days. It just seems like there’s more to the story, like he’s faced something like this before.” 

Steve wanted to reply, but in all honesty, he couldn’t find anything to say, because when it was all boiled down, Sam was right- this was odd. But what could they do? Their only option was to wait and see what the future brought.

* * *

Now that Happy was wide awake, and heading back to the compound with an over-hyper sleep-deprived teenager in a spider-suit, he was seriously questioning his reasoning. 

At the time, it had seemed like a good idea, since that way Peter could be watched and May wouldn’t have to worry, and Peter would be safe at home instead of roaming the streets, but now, it just seemed like Happy had signed himself up for hours upon hours of a spider-infused teen talking his ear off until his inevitable crash.

At least May seemed grateful to not have to worry about being called to the ER just to see her nephew badly wounded.

Still though, he couldn’t help but sigh in relief as the compound finally came into sight. 

“Alight kid, time to get out,” he announced as the car came to a stop in front of the large building. “Go straight to your room and get some rest, I’m gonna go park the car, ok?”

“Yessir Mr. Happy,” the kid replied lazily as he hopped out of the car and into the building, leaving a very relieved Happy to go park the car, blissfully unaware of the mistake he had just made in letting Peter face the compound alone.

* * *

Peter should’ve gone to bed.

Peter knew he should’ve gone to bed, but he also knew he shouldn’t have gone up to the roof and call Happy that early in the morning, but, technically speaking, it hadn’t been him, it had been _ Spider-Man_, and Spider-Man didn’t need any sleep ( _ boy oh boy _having an alternate ego can mess with you when you’re tired).

As he stared at the elevator numbers lining the wall, he couldn’t help but feel like they didn’t really matter, not in the endgame.

Like, pretty much whatever button he pressed, the doors would close, the elevator would go nyooooooooon, and the doors would reopen, then BAM, a different floor. That’s how it worked, and he was quite a clever person, so he truly did understand elevators.

So he decidedly picked a button to press, then leaned back up against the wall waiting for the metal box to lift him up into the air like a wingless fairy.

When he arrived on the floor, he got out and looked around, but it all pretty much seemed rather boring, so he got back on and tried a few other floors in the hope that they’d be more interesting.

Finally, he heard voices on one of the floors, and got off, making sure his mask was still securely on his face before he continued walking to where he heard the voices come from, only to be met by Nat, and Steve, watching through glass as Sam spoke with a man at a table. 

It was sorta like if Steve and Nat were watching a tea party through a window, only they were the ones with tea, and Sam was just with a guy at a table. Ok, so that was a bad analogy, but did it really matter at this point?

No, no it did not.

* * *

Sam was annoyed. 

Nat had been in there for thirty minutes before him, and now he had been in there for another thirty minutes, but this guy hadn’t said shit. 

Steve knocked on the one-way glass that currently just appeared to be a mirror, signalling to Sam that it was time to switch, and Sam tiredly got up to leave the room.

It was only when he left the room that he desperately wished he could go back in as he saw that none other than Queens' very own spandex-wearing hero had decided to make an appearance.

“Heyo Sammy son,” the arachnid greeted cheerfully, in that same voice that made villains want to strangle him, which, coincidently, also made everyone else want to strangle him as well.

“What’s he doing here?” Sam asked tiredly.

“I just came by to say hi,” Spidey explained simply. “But Cap mention what ya’ll be doing here, and I’d be more than happy to take a crack at him-“

“_ No, _” Sam answered automatically.

“Aw come on,” Clint prodded. “It wouldn’t be a bad idea to let him have a go at it.”

“Legally, he can’t,” Sam reminded him.

“Does the law really matter when justice is on the line?” Spider-Man answered to no one’s asked question.

“…Uh, yes?”

“Sorry Spidey, I’m not sure it’s such a great idea either,” Steve agreed. “It’s my turn to go in, but feel free to stay and watch.”

And Spidey did.

Steve came out again, still unsuccessful in gaining any knowledge.

"Come on, everyone else has had a turn now, trust me, I can handle this," Spider-Man reasoned.

"It's much harder than it looks," Steve assured him.

“Chill guys- I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m pretty darn smooth when it comes to handling people,” Spider-Man said in a relaxed tone as he jumped off the couch, landing in a confidently over-the-top pose.

“Really? Since when?” Sam scoffed, earning himself a glare from the Spider.

“Uhm, who’s the one person here who has successfully kept his identity a secret from everyone?”

“If we really wanted to, we could figure you out Spidey,” Natasha stated boredly.

“Yes, but you don’t want to, so you haven’t, and thus I still have my identity intact.”

“Am I allowed to remind you that Clint and I are actual super-spies who have had had multiple secret identities?”

“No, you’re not allowed… at least not right now since I’m trying to be cool, but I totally wanna hear all about that later if that’s ok.”

Nat shot him a thumbs up in reply as Steve cleared his throat to gain the team’s attention. 

“Look, Spider-Man, I don’t want to seem rude, but the fact remains that you aren’t a member of the Avengers- and you know that we all do like you-“

“-Speak for yourself.” Sam cut in

“-You know that we all like you,” Steve re-stated, slightly miffed. “But the fact remains that without being an official Avenger, you can’t participate in our missions unless it was directed allowed by the accords. I’m sorry.”

“Aw, come on Cap,” Spidey pleaded. "Just lemme try!"

* * *

“So… you into doin’ shady business in Queens?” Peter asked in his most desperate attempt of a menacing voice without initiating the interrogation mode.

No response.

“Cool cool cool. Y’know, I’ve seen some shady things in the past, particularly in Queens. You’re not included in them… BAM! HOW’S THAT FOR A GAME CHANGER BRO?!?”

Still no responses, even to that sick burn. Who calls things _ ‘sick’ _ anymore anyway? And that admittedly wasn’t his greatest burn, but right now, right here?? This was _his _house (it was Mr. Stark’s but whatever), and he was gonna set this place on fire.

“You think you’re _sooo _cool huh? You think you’re cool cuz you were caught with a high-tech weapon, and cuz now you’re being interviewed- uh I mean interrogated- by the Avengers? Well, guess what? You ain’t so cool now, cuz the Avengers left, and now all you’re left with is a freakin fursona vigilante- so you better start talkin if you wanna seem important again.”

Hmmm, this guy was tough... maybe he should've practiced how to be more intimidating? That probably would've been a good way to spend his time... oh well.

Just because _he _wasn't intimidating, didn't mean that he had to be intimidated by this guy. If anyone's seen they're fair share of sketchy shit in the past, it was the kid who grew up in New York.

“Yeah, like I was saying, I’ve seen some shady stuff in the past… got some… Shady stuff of my own under this mask… it’s ok, we all got a dark past. We’ve all made mistakes. I… live a double life, and I’m not proud of it.”

Still. No. Reaction.

But honestly, at this point, Peter had sorta forgotten why he was here, so he kept going on.

“I’ve been through some pretty tough times,” Spidey admitted with a yawn as he lay strewn across the interrogation table. To be fair, he would've gotten off if the guy asked him to, but he didn't seem to mind, thus, it wasn’t _not _ok for him to lay there- at least that’s how math works anyways.

“Y’know, I’ve worked in lots of different places in Queens since I was sixteen, and I gotta say, pretty much every job I worked had this weird unspoken sketchy side to it I never understood, but sometimes you just gotta not question it.”

He sat upright on the table and turned towards the man before continuing.

“It’s really funny actually, cuz like the tech store I worked at? Yeah, that’s definitely gonna have some shady dealings. A thrift store? Yeah, I can see that, but definitely the strangest one was when I worked as a pizza delivery guy in Manhatten, I was really desperate for a job to pay rent- but lemme tell you, delivering stuff to the people of Manhatten is a weird job, but the strangest was the person who ordered an unhealthy amount of pizza at least once a week, but no one ever saw them… like ever.”

The man stared boredly at Spidey, but in his sleep-deprived state, he took that as an invitation to keep going.

“But like, I’ve had orders where they asked the pizza to be left outside and they leave the payment or whatever- but this guy always asked for the pizza to be delivered to one particular manhole and just leave it there. Like they always left a payment for me, and it was always gone soon after, so it wasn't like, a ghost or anything, it’s just… I never saw them… it was super sketchy now that I think about it, probably some crime lord or something who wanted pizza for his whole mob- so I’ve really been through the worst of the worst buddy,” he stated punching his hand in his fist.

* * *

Alas, despite the relentless chatter of Spider-Man, the guy still never caved, and nine o'clock rolled around without them being able to gain any information.

“Cap and I will take him to the feds,” Sam volunteered. “Nat, I think you and Spidey need some rest.”

“A-are you sure? I can help-“

“It’s ok Spider-Man,” Steve reassured. “We got this.”

The two nodded before heading off to get some sleep as Sam and Steve cuffed the man and began to walk to the front of the compound, keeping a careful watch on the man.

it was silent as they rode the elevator down to the ground floor, not one of them saying a word, until the man began to laugh, at first quietly, but it soon became louder and more condescending. His laughter wasn’t the sort of uncontrolled madness one might expect someone to have before being taken away, but more of a subtle, controlled laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Sam asked in annoyance as the elevator doors opened and they shoved the man out, being the short walk towards the doors.

“I just think it’s quite funny that you actually allowed Spider-Man to waste all your time like that,” the man rasped out in response. 

“He was working with us willingly, and while I admit there were better ways to handle that situation, we appreciate his help,” Steve defended.

It was once again quiet as they walked through the front doors of the compound, and stopped as the FBI agents made their way towards them.

“All I’m saying is, you let the _one person _who isn’t an Avenger take over during the time you might’ve broken me. Do you really think him being there early in the morning was a coincidence?”

Steve caught Sam’s eye as the realization hit them both.

“We need to get this guy back in to interrogate him,” Sam commanded immediately as the agent walked up.

“I’m sorry, but-“

“Come’n man, he’s so close to cracking-“

“Sam.” Steve interrupted. “He’s doing this on purpose. If we bring him back, he’s not going to suddenly become cooperative. Besides, there’s no way we can know if he’s telling the truth about any of this, come on, let’s get some sleep.”

The offer of sleep seemed appealing, so Sam made no attempt to argue any further… 

But still, the seeds of doubt had been watered, and no amount of sleep was about to change that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have I mentioned I love tmnt??? No??? O o f 
> 
> oh well
> 
> (This isn’t a crossover fic btw ofc, I just wanted to do a lil throwaway line with them)
> 
> okkkk so if anyone is wondering why the Avengers were allowed to keep this random guy for so long, lets just say that during the guy’s trial and hearing they were allowed to keep him, and when he lost, they could keep him until the feds could come pick him up.
> 
> I really suck at law stuff, and I know there’s probably a bunch of stuff that’s wrong, but pls don’t judge I'm a really tired idiot


	8. Welcome to T-T-T-TARGEEEEET

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a cursed chapter tbh

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyyyyy so I just wanted to say thank you so so so much for all the support and comments!! And I’m really sorry for not replying yet, I’m just really stressed with school and stuff, but you guys are seriously awesome I love you, and I definitely wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for all of you!!
> 
> It was really nice to see so many of the usual commenters too- I really missed you all! So thank you for coming back!! It was also awesome to meet all the new people too!! Anywaysss I just wanted to say thanks!!
> 
> Also I wanted to let you know that I probably won’t have a consistent update schedule- I’m really sorry, but I find it kinda stressful and stuff, and I don’t want to turn out shitty chapters just cuz its a new one, but I will try to keep the chapters coming since it really is fun to write!!
> 
> Ok, thats all- I really hope you enjoy!!!!

There are places in the world that hold an unstoppable force, a force that holds a sort of unlawful vibe, a force like 7-11- which is where Happy stopped to get gas on the way to the Avengers compound- where Peter slipped out to go buy some gummy worms so he could bribe Clint later to tell him any new gossip he might’ve overheard.

At 7-11 though, there are many things could go wrong. For instance, there was the always-open broom closet that he could trip into and get stuck in, the cramped shelves that he could knock over by accident all-too-easily with his super strength, the fact that it was easy to rob, or even the terribly bad idea of not telling Happy he was going inside, meaning the man could drive away any second, leaving him stranded here alone.

All these things _ could _ happen, but none of them ever did. 7-11 provided the perfect way for all of your worst nightmares to come true, but it was somehow balanced in a weird sort of cosmic justice that meant that it never actually _ did _ happen. It was like the world was frozen in time there.

So that’s why Peter was able to safely purchase his gummy worms, and easily slip back into the car without Happy ever realizing he was gone, and soon the two of them had begun to head back on route to the compound in peace… Until Mr. Stark called Happy with a list of things for some last-minute dinner party, so they drove another ten minutes off course to the nearest Target.

“I’ll be quick, you can just stay in here kid,” Happy instructed as he got out and headed towards the doors.

Peter watched as Happy walked towards the store until he finally disappeared between the two automatic doors, leaving him alone in the car- well, not completely alone, there were still like, fifteen people in the parking lot driving/walking around- but alone in the sense that he didn’t know anyone in the immediate area.

He reached into his backpack and pulled out his homework, staring at it impatiently for a few minutes before giving up any hope of getting anything done, so he took out his phone before realizing that it was on the verge of death, so he chose to save its last few moments of life for an emergency, and slipped it back into his pocket, along with stashing his homework back into his bag.

He glanced at the seat beside him where Sam’s drone was sitting- apparently Happy had brought it to one of the SI buildings downtown to get in fitted with one of the specialized parts that had broken, which was now lying beside it, waiting to be fixed, so Peter decided to busy himself by trying to fix the drone himself, and about half an hour later, it seemed to be fully fitted and ready to fly.

In hindsight though, maybe he should’ve realized that he couldn’t properly fix a high-tech drone with nothing but his emergency tech kit he carried on around for his spider-suit.

He glanced out the car window again and checked to see if Happy was coming, but the man wasn’t in sight. 

‘_ I’ll be quick so you can just stay in here,’ _that’s what everybody always said, but he was always left in the car for annoyingly long periods of time, and it was starting to get old; so he grabbed the drone and it’s controller and walked over to the emptier section of the parking lot so he could test fly it.

He turned it on before setting it on the ground and taking a few steps back, attaching the controller to his arm and lifting Redwing off the ground.

The machine zoomed upward and he couldn’t help but smile at the little buzzing sound it made- it was kinda cute if he was being honest. He kept on flying it for a while and found himself fairly satisfied with the way it whirred around like a giant hummingbird.

The peaceful flight, however, was soon interrupted by a buzzing sound coming from the remote. He looked down in surprised concern.

_ Connection lost _

“Shit,” he muttered as he watched the drone buzz around- it was bound to drop down any minute, and he had to catch it when it did.

It veered around for a bit, going left and right as Peter followed it on the ground below, debating if the people in the parking lot would question it if he suddenly jumped super high to catch it since using his web-shooters was out of the question in a public place like this. Thankfully the drone was just moving aimlessly and slowly near the ground, so he was almost positive he could get it back somehow-

The drone suddenly sped ahead, yeeting itself forward into Target, leaving Peter behind in silent shock.

This was a mess.

* * *

Peter raced inside the store, desperate to catch a glance of the floating red drone, but it was already gone, lost to the endless aisles- but no, this wasn’t where his story was going to end, he would find that drone if it was the last thing he did.

“Peter? What are you doing here?”

He whipped around to where the familiar voice had called.

“_ Ned? _ You work here?” He asked in disbelief.

“Nah, I’m just doing a favour for my second cousin,” Ned explained.

“Huh. Have you seen Happy by any chance?”

“He’s here too?”

“Yeah, he’s here- wait, have you seen Redwing? He flew in here a few seconds ago.”

“Dude, we don’t let drones in the store.”

“Yeah that’s why I’m looking for him, can you help?”

“We can check the security cameras,” Ned offered.

“Yes, perfect! Thank you so much.”

* * *

After scanning the screens for nearly a minute, Peter and Ned located the drone on the screen where people were staring up in shock as Redwing zoomed past.

“It looks like he’s headed to the toy aisle,” Ned noted.

“Ok Ima head over, keep me updated!” Peter shouted as he ran out towards where they had last seen the drone, while simultaneously dialling Ned with his dying phone.

Peter slid into the aisle of toys, with the drone no longer there. He frowned as he turned around, trying to locate the camera, staring at it as he spoke to Ned.

“I don’t see it anywhere.”

No response.

“Ned?”

_ “Sorry, it turns out this costumer that was banned came back, and I gotta track her down.” _

“Seriously? That’s hella cool- do you want help?”

_ “Nah, I can handle it, you need to get that drone outta here though.” _

“Yep, I’m on it, see ya later.”

_ “Bye,” _ Ned responded before Peter hung up with a sigh. He didn’t really feel like running all around the store looking for the drone… but luckily, the bike aisle was right next to the toy aisle…

* * *

Peter zoomed through the store on his bike, chasing the sounds of surprised people, leading to where there would hopefully be a flying drone, when he saw a glimpse of it from across the store.

“Gotcha,” He muttered to himself before pedaling at top speed to where he’d seen the drone when it suddenly took a quick turn into an aisle- but Peter had no intention of losing Redwing as he swerved around the corner, narrowly avoiding a woman who’d been running down the aisle, jumping out of the way just in time… but behind the lady was Ned, who was currently out of breath, and unable to jump out of the way.

Peter desperately pulled on the breaks, but it was too late, and the two boys collided.

“Dude, why are you on a bike?” Ned asked, his voice muffled from underneath Peter.

“It’s faster. Why’re you chasing that lady?”

“She’s the person that was banned.”

“Makes sense,” Peter breathed, getting up off of his friend and helping him get up.

“I don’t think you’re allowed to take the bikes out of the area.”

“I didn’t see any signs- look I gotta get Redwing, good luck with that lady,” he said before getting back on the bike and darting off.

* * *

Ned wasn’t having the best day himself.

Dealing with annoying customers was one thing, but he sure hadn’t signed up for running around the store chasing this one person.

He had wanted to let it go, but he was doing this for his second-cousin, so he had to succeed. It didn’t exactly help that it was a Friday afternoon though since pretty much all of his functioning brain cells were gone for the week, causing him to not even consider calling the security desk as the manager had probably purposed.

So now he was chasing this lady all around the store, with something vaguely familiar about her, but she was never still long enough for him to see her clearly- and now he’d pretty much lost track of her altogether.

He sighed as he made his way through the toy aisle- only stopping to put the Spider-Man action figure next to the Iron Man one- when he saw the lady up ahead.

“Ma’am,” He called out, but all too soon he realized what a stupid thing calling out to her was, since the moment she caught sight of him, she jumped up and pulled down the container of plastic balls down before running off, leaving Ned alone to watch his life flash before his eyes as he was engulfed in a sea of colourful bouncy balls.

* * *

Peter had finally gotten back on the trail of Redwing again, but with every turn, he was losing the drone more- if he let it turn that corner without him, it would be lost forever, and he couldn’t let that happen.

He turned into the frozen food aisle and caught sight of Redwing at the end. It was too far, he wasn’t going to make it on time… unless- 

He quickly observed that it was pretty much empty- there was only one other person in this aisle, and he seemed occupied searching through one of the glass fridge-door things, so Peter quickly tapped his web-shooters and took aim, successfully grabbing on to the drone.

The good news was, he was now attached to Redwing. The bad news was that he was also attached to wheels, and Redwing was a very strong drone, and despite his super strength, he forgot he’d be needing it to pull back the drone, so the second he was attached, the bike started speeding down the row, leaving Peter to desperately grasp at the nearest thing to stop himself, which turned out to be the man’s shopping cart… which also had wheels.

The man turned around in surprise when he noticed the shopping cart moving away.

“Peter?”

“Happy-“ 

But in Peter’s surprise, he accidentally let go of the release switch on his shooters, leaving him to desperately grasp at the small string, and attach it to the nearest thing, which was Happy’s shopping cart… 

Which no one was holding on to…

Peter and Happy watched as Redwing carried off the cart, swinging it around, knocking over the display’s in the store, zooming through the sea of products. Peter felt as Happy turned towards him with frustration, but he couldn’t bring himself to face the man.

“Get off the bike Parker,” he ordered.

“What?” He asked weakly.

“Get off.”

Peter had no courage to argue, and he got off shamefully, still avoiding Happy’s glare as the man took the bike from him, and instead got on himself, causing Peter to look up in confusion, only to see Happy _ nyoom _ off on the bike.

“Holy shit, that was the best thing ever,” he said to himself as he watched Happy's retreating figure before realizing that Happy yeeting himself through the store at an incredibly fast pace _ without _ a spidey sense to tell him where things were was an incredibly bad idea, so he ran off in the direction the man went.

He was starting to think that he’d seen the last of Happy, but just then, he heard a crash and a cry of pain, so he ran towards the sound only to find Happy laying on his back with his leg somehow stuck in one of the bike’s wheels, surrounded by dozens of plastic balls.

“Happy! Are you ok?” He asked worriedly as he made his way through the balls.

“What do you think Parker?” He groaned in pain.

I’ll get one of the workers- don’t worry.”

It was ok, everything would be fine- why wouldn’t it be? Happy just fell over some balls, that's all… and his leg _ had _ gotten stuck in a bike, but it probably wasn’t serious…

* * *

Peter watched as Happy was driven away on the ambulance.

Ok, so Happy had broken his leg. That wasn’t so great, but Happy made him promise to get what Mr. Stark needed.

And get Redwing back.

He had to finish what Happy had started, he had to complete this mission- it was his duty- nay, _ his purpose _, as a non-Avenger to complete this task.

Peter headed back inside the store and began to roam the aisles once more, going where hardly anyone ever went- until finally, he heard the sound of a cart clanging recklessly through the store, and raced towards the noise, catching sight of the pair of things he was after zipping along the back wall.

There was no time to hesitate, this mission had already taken Happy- it was now or never.

Peter raced towards the drone, and jumped.

He jumped too high, too far, and fell directly into the open broom closet, the last thing he heard before he lost consciousness was the door slamming shut behind him.

* * *

Peter sat up in a rush but was only met with darkness.

His first thought was ‘_ Omigod I’m blind?!’ _ But his second was the realization of what really happened: He was stuck in a closet with no way out, and it was perfectly safe to say that he was freaking the heck out. 

He tried opening the door the normal way, but the handle wasn’t budging, and he realized with devastation that it was locked.

_ Great. _

* * *

Peter had been banging as loudly as he could without taking the door down since even though it was really inconvenient and slightly terrifying to be stuck in a closet, it would be even more inconvenient for one of the workers there to fix the door if he broke it down, and also he’d have to explain how he took it down since quote honestly he doubted many people would believe that he was able to break down a heavy door like this alone.

But as this point, he honestly didn’t know what to do: Happy was probably on his way to the hospital, Ned was trying to hunt down some lady who’d been banned, and on top of it all, some drone was lugging a cart full of Mr. Stark’s very much needed groceries around the store, and here he was, trapped in a closet in an area where no one ever came, left with pretty much nothing but darkness and his clothes (and a few brooms, but that was beside the point).

He shoved his hands in his pockets, trying to keep them from shaking when he felt the cold, cracked screen of his phone- his phone!

He pulled it out and desperately pushed the home button, which thankfully lit up, shining the hopefulness of life into the small cramped room. Only three percent of its battery remained, but Peter was gonna make sure it counted.

He quickly pulled out Ned’s number and waited impatiently as it rang, but no one picked up, so he left a quick message, already knowing that it was more likely for Ned to find him on his own before ever checking his voicemail, but it was worth a shot anyway.

His phone battery was down to two percent, and he decided it was time to start panicking even more since May and MJ were in Queens, Happy was on his way to the hospital, and he’d be dead if Mr. Stark ever heard about this, so his options on who he to call were really narrowing down.

He briefly wondered if this counted as an emergency, and if so, could he call Carol? There was also Pepper, but something told him that if he called Ms. Potts, then Mr. Stark would be hearing about it too… but there was Scott! And he had his number too!

He quickly dialled, and nearly cried with relief when the other line was picked up.

“Hey Scott, I really need your help right now if you're in New York-“

“Sorry,” a woman’s voice cut off. “This is Hope Pym, Scott left his phone behind, I’m just bringing it to him right now- who is this?”

“Sp- uhhhh Peter… Parker- I-I’m Mr. Stark’s intern.”

“Oh, ok, well, is there anything I can help with? I’m still looking for Scott.”

“You're looking for him? Did he shrink or something? Wait, sorry, is this a bad time? Cuz I can just call someone else-“

“Nah, everything’s good,” she responded as he heard something crashing behind her- or was that in the store? Eh, whatever. “You're in high school right? Did you have a question for a project or something? I’m pretty good with that sort of thing if you need help.”

“Um, thanks, but I’m actually sorta… stuck? Somewhere, and I just… thought maybe he was near the compound so he could help.”

“What? Someone trapped you?” She asked in concern as Peter once again checked his phone battery- one percent- this wasn’t looking good.

“‘No I’m fine just my driver broke his leg and is being taken away and my friend is trying to defend stuff from being stolen and I’m just trapped in a really small place and I only have one percent of life left before I die so I really gotta go I’mreallysorrytohangupsoabruptlyokbyeeeee!” He ended the phone call and finally sucked up his pride and decided to call Mr. Stark, his one last choice-

It died. His phone was dead, and him along with it.

Life was meaningless, samosas no longer came spiced, and he had lost at the last seven Kahoot rounds.

As he sat down on the floor, utterly defeated, he let his life flash before his eyes, wondering if he could ever be at peace with this or of ending when he was suddenly blinded by a light- was this really the end?

The poor target employee screeched when she saw the person with a dead look in his eyes lying against the wall of the closet, and the door slammed once again, leaving Peter to wonder if it had just been a hallucination.

But sure enough, the door soon reopened, and Peter immediately hugged the worker before darting off into freedom… unfortunately, he had forgotten about his heightened senses, which meant he was practically blinded by the sudden exposure to the florescent lighting, so he shut his eyes again to relish in the darkness, but ended up slamming through a shelf, taking down the singular poor soul who was standing in the literature aisle looking amoungst the cheesy romance books on sale.

As Peter felt the body below him breathe, he couldn’t help but wonder: was this moment the start of his own cheesy romance story?

“I am so sorry,” he mumbled trying to get up through the himself-shaped-hole he had left in the bookcase which had saved them both from being squashed like bugs. He opened his eye, finally adjusting to the light, and looked upon the person he had fallen on… 

The unconscious body of Scott Lang.

“Omigosh,” he choked out. “Are you ok Mr. Lang?” He asked, desperately shaking the lifeless body. “Omigosh whatdoIdo,” he turned and saw the employee who had opened the closet standing in shock at the fallen bookcase, looking as if she wanted to faint herself.

Neither of them made any moves- it was kinda hard to figure out what to do in a situation like this.

Thankfully, neither of them would’ve had a chance to make any moves before the banned woman came skirting around the aisle corner with Ned right behind her.

Ned skidded to a stop when he saw the fallen shelf with Peter on top of an unconscious body, but the woman was unfazed, and jumped on the shelf, running on top of it as if it was normal ground.

It wasn’t until she got closer though, that Peter finally recognized her.

“Hope?” The woman stopped in her tracks and looked down at the body that Peter was cradling as Ned tiredly walked up and the other employee ran off.

“Is that Scott?” She asked in concern.

“Peter, what the hell man?” Ned asked as he joined the group.

“Wait, your Spidey’s kid- Ned?” Hope said in disbelief.

“I was chasing a fucking Avenger this whole time?” Ned asked with the deadness that only a target employee could muster up.

“He’s not my kid,” Peter answered tiredly, collapsing on top of Scott once again, leaving the four of them to stand/lay in silence for an uncomfortably long amount of time.

“Ms. Pym,” Ned started tiredly, “You’ve been banned from this Target location, can you please leave?”

“You’re the lady banned from Target?” Peter asked, his voice muffled from on top of Scott.

“It’s a long story, I was in the car but Scott forgot his phone, which meant he didn’t have a list, which meant he was going to get sidetracked,” she explained. “Trust me, I didn’t want to come into this forbidden place either, but if you just let me grab Scott, we’ll be out of here now.”

Ned nodded and lifted the unwilling Peter off of Scott as Hope reached down for her own baggage when Redwing flew past them, lugging the cart of Mr. Stark’s groceries behind it.

“Ugh, I forgot about that,” Peter stated, finally standing up on his own again.

“That’s yours?” Hope asked passively as they watched it zoom by.

“It’s actually Sam’s.”

“Who are you again?”

“Spider-Man,” he responded with a tired expression. There was no point in hiding it from her when Scott already knew- and honestly, he realized that this was one of the few chances he would get in telling the truth before it got out of hand, leaving it harder to reveal like with the others.

That and he was just really tired.

“No, seriously kid, who are you?”

“Spider-Man,” he answered again, slightly frustrated.

“He is,” Ned volunteered.

“But I thought-“ she began confusedly, but Peter just waved it off. 

“Can we save this for later? We need to stop Redwing first and bring Mr. Stark his groceries before dinner… and I need someone to drive me to the compound, I don’t have my full license yet, can I get a ride with you two?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Cool, thanks. Now let’s go catch us a drone, come on Ned.”

“Wait, what about Mr. Lang?”

“I dunno, pour some Mountian Dew on him and get let’s get going team.”

“Since when were you made leader? Shouldn’t Ms. Pym be in charge?”

“No, she’s the rebel with a dark past who’s on the run, your the police officer who begrudgingly came along so you can capture her after, Mr. Lang is our… Ummm, he’s the… we’ll come back to him when he gets up- but we all have our roles, and I'm the leader. Hope, can you grab some frozen corn or something so we can wake him up? Oh- And Happy is my dead parental figure, and I’m finishing his one last mission… the one that he died on…”

“Wait, Peter where’s Happy? Is he ok? I thought he drove you here?”

“Found the frozen corn,” Hope announced, tossing the bag to Peter, who then tossed it on Scott’s face, startling him awake.

“Hey Scott, which team member did you wanna be? Can I take leader? I already have a dead parent figure, so I wanted it, but Ned thinks that it should be you or Hope-“

“Peter seriously what happened to Happy?”

“Did a bookcase just fall on me?” Scott asked, rubbing his head in pain.

“Woah he figured it out. Ok, so Scott can be our smart guy.”

“I think he’s the dumbest one out of all four of us, actually,” Hope said skeptically.

“So he can be the dumb one. Ok team lets not waste any more time- split up and find redwing- Bug-team go! Well- bug-arachnid-human-team go, but whatever- just go!”

* * *

So now four people were racing through the store in search of a drone.

Ned had gone back to the security room, and Scott had found a pack of four walkie talkies on the discount shelf (they were Dora themed, so they were pretty rad, to say the least), and now they were all headed through the store in search of the cart/drone.

“This is so cool,” Ned commented. “I’m literally the guy in the chair- I have access to all the security, and like, I get to see everyone on screen.”

“And we have walkie-talkies!” Scott added excitedly.

“Yeah! Ok, Ms. Pym, the target is nearing your location- its two aisles away, get ready.”

“Copy- you can just call me Hope though.”

“Haha, I’d _ hope _ so,” Peter added with a laugh.

“Boo, go home Parker,” Ned replied.

“Hey, we should have code names!” Scott suggested.

“Oooooh, yeah we should,” Peter joined, ignoring the fact that as superheroes they already had code names. “Ned’s the guy in the chair.”

“Naturally,” Ned replied. “Ms. Hope is the Banned Target.”

“Hm, that works. Scott can be Frozen Corn if we’re going with Target themed names,” Hope added.

“Hey, why do I get the lame one?”

“You should’ve done something cooler than looking through the literature section,” Peter remarked.

“Peter’s the Drone Demon,” Ned volunteered. “Oh! Or the Bike Chaser?”

“Shelf-Crasher? Closet-Case?” Hope offered.

“I kinda like Drone Demon, it sounds pretty cool.”

“Yessss- uh, Hope- um Banned Target, you missed Redwing.”

“Ah shit.”

* * *

After countless tries and fails, the three heroes finally managed to corner Redwing, and capture it along with the cart.

It really shouldn’t have taken as long as it did considering they were three non-Avengers who were pretty darn close to being Avengers, but they had also sorta been having fun with it and hadn’t wanted it to end, so maybe that's why they subconsciously had kept it going for such a long time. 

Either way, they had finally succeeded, and Peter had quickly disabled Redwing, and Hope was now waiting outside for Scott and Peter to finish their shopping, and Ned went to clean up the many balls that had fallen on the ground.

Peter grabbed the majority of the bags, and the two heroes emerged from the store into darkness…

“Holy shit what time is it?” Peter asked in sudden panic.

“I dunno, Hope has my phone.”

“Mine is dead- shit Mr. Stark’s gonna be so pissed.”

* * *

Tony was, in fact, very pissed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m gonna be real with you guys for a sec: Target was only in Canada for like, a year, I haven’t been in one recently, so I’m basically just going off of Walmarts since they’re pretty much the same tbh (apparently Target is like, cleaner or smtg, idk they seemed the same to me)
> 
> Also yea, this is something that would never happen irl, cuz they would’ve been kicked out etc, etc, but to be fair, none of these situations would happen irl, so lets just roll with it
> 
> I’ve had a few people ask, so my Tumblr is @justkindofghosting if anyone wanted- just a warning, I don’t post much marvel stuff, my main fandoms are Tangled, musicals, and TMNT, but hey if u wanna see me delay writing consistently, then u can come chill and stuff- u can ask stuff abt my fics there and I’ll answer and stuff, so yea! Come chill w/ me


	9. "miX IT ALL TogEthER anD yOU KnOW YoU GOT the BesT oF BoTH woRLDs" "ahAAHAHAHa"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Do ya'll like Hannah Montana???
> 
> Ever think abt how Peter low-key has the same life as her???

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hahaaaaaa
> 
> so I'm back

It was eight pm when the Avengers left the compound with the promise to return in twelve hours.

* * *

It was eight' o’ five when Peter and Ned realized that meant they had the place practically to themselves.

* * *

Tony was smart enough to restrict the two teens from going into the labs while the team was gone.

After all, within the week of knowing Peter was Spider-Man, Peter had convinced Ned to hack the fairly secure suit, so leaving them alone to tamper in the labs for half a day wasn’t a good idea.

The only problem that left the two boys with was how to cope with extreme boredom while in what should be the most interesting place ever. Their solution? Host a Star Wars marathon on the Avengers floor- since it was the most comfortable- and since they weren't sure if Pepper was at the compound that night, it was safer than being on Tony's floor.

They had just finished _ Revenge of the Sith _ after decidedly skipping _ Attack of the Clones, _and were finally headed onwards to the better movies. Peter was currently microwaving popcorn for both of them as Ned stayed sprawled out on one of the couches.

“Dude, you are _ so _ lucky this is your life,” Ned expressed for what seemed like the millionth time as Peter pulled the popcorn from the microwave before throwing the second bag in.

“Ned, this is pretty much your life now too,” he reminded.

“Yeah but like, you have the whole superpowers and secret identity thing going too… like Hannah Montana or something.”

“Well, I don’t know how _ ‘secret’ _my identity is since the Avengers pretty much have my identity figured out by now. I mean, it’s the wrong identity, but they still think it’s true, so like, I guess that still counts as being found out.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“None of this makes sense. Like yeah, I’m pretty much Hannah Montana at this point, and honestly, I was expecting it to be more interesting, but… oh my god…”

“What?”

“I’m literally living Hannah Montana’s life Ned!”

“DUDE!?”

“I KNOW RIGHT? THIS IS SO FREAKIN AWESOME.”

“Peter, does this mean I’m Lily?”

“Uh yeah, who else would you be?”

“This is so cool!”

They were probably (most definitely) getting way too hyped over this, but it was currently one-thirty am, so it was valid. And though you might hope that this was the end of it, there was no possible way that it would end there.

It was now past one-thirty in the morning. They had been eating excessive amounts of sugar. 

Not to mention they were almost the only ones in the building, who also had pretty much an unlimited amount of props and different locations to film in.

So what other option was there really, but to film a recreation of the Hannah Montana theme song with Peter instead?

No one could stop them.

And no one did.

* * *

“I feel like there should be more to it,” Ned commented after taking the seventh shot of glitter being thrown over Spider-Man as he attempted to spin in the perfect diva twirl.

“Yeah, I feel like... I feel like there should be live music or something.”

“I don’t know how to play anything though, and correct me if I’m wrong, but you only play the clarinet, right? And no one else knows about you, so...”

Peter and Ned sat in disappointed thought for a moment before Peter snapped and sat up, quickly grabbing his phone.

“I know someone.”

* * *

It was two-thirty.

It was two-thirty and his damn phone was ringing.

It was either an emergency, or someone forgot the time zone difference from California to New York again. 

Either way, Scott didn’t think twice as he picked up without even looking at the contact.

“Hello?” He asked tiredly.

“Um, hey Scott, it’s Spidey.”

He sat up in an instant. “Are you ok? Do you need help on a mission? I’m in New York right now so I can come- are-“

“I-I’m fine, don’t worry!” Spidey said in a rush. “I just wanted to know if you can play any instruments!”

“Oh...” he thought about it for a second. It wasn’t professionally, but he was pretty sure it counted...

“I can play the drums,” he admitted.

“Really? No way dude! That is so cool!”

“I’m not the best at it, but it’s pretty fun,” he agreed, enjoying the conversation despite his tiredness.

“That’s awesome- hey so, do you wanna come to the Avengers compound? We wanted someone to play the Hannah Montana theme song live, and-“ 

“Wait, like right now? Like come over there right now?”

“Yeah, everyone else is gone, so like, why not? I can get some snacks ready and stuff, and we have a lil party or something?”

Scott thought about it. He didn't really have a reason to say no.

So he didn't.

“I’ll be there soon.”

* * *

This wasn’t an emergency, it didn’t count as one, and Peter knew it, but what was the point of having your friends number if it was only for emergencies? Also, he was pretty sleep deprived and wasn’t thinking clearly, so he dialed.

“Spidey, what's the emergency?” The voice said almost instantly after barely one ring.

“H-hey Carol. No emergency, I just wanted to call and say hi... sorry, I didn’t take into account the time differences- wait, do you have time differences in space? What’s the time zone you guys use? Where are you by the way? How’s-“

Carol laughed on the other side of the phone. “Everything’s good so far, I’m on a small break right now, how’s it going over on Terra?”

“Good, yeah, everything’s been good so far- so um, this might sound random, but do you know how to play any instruments?”

“I think I might've played the guitar...” Carol thought back on the memory with a smile. It was fuzzy, like most of her memories, but still there to some extent, and it was a good one.

“That so cool! Do, uh, um nevermind, I’m sure your super busy-“

“Why? What do you need?”

“It’s really stupid, I um...”

“...”

"..."

“Do you wanna, like come over to earth and play the guitar with Ant-Man and me?”

“When?”

“Uhm… now…”

“Like right now right now?”

“... yes.”

“I have some time, I’ll head there right now- be right there Spider-boy.”

The phone went down on the other side.

“What’d she say?” Ned finally asked.

“She’s coming.”

* * *

It was three-thirty when they both arrived at the compound, with Peter and Ned waiting for them outside as Carol arrived for the landing and Scott drove in.

Peter and Ned had searched the compound for instruments and after finding the drums and an electric guitar, they opted to head to the roof to set it up, since it’d look cooler for filming.

After some quick introductions, they had a quick discussion on the music sheet, had a few snacks and decided to chill and catch up a little while the Ramones played in the background. 

Ned and Spidey had been working on slight lyric changes to the song, and it was around four when they decided to go start practicing.

It took a few tries, but there was nothing more fun than failing at playing instruments with your friends while sleep deprived on the roof of a mostly empty building.

* * *

Mostly empty being Pepper as the exception.

Pepper was used to noise late at night, especially after living with Tony for so long. She’d often wake up to hear one of his suits landing, or the whir of machines in his workshop, or even laughter as he talked with the other Avengers.

Though usually their floor in the compound was almost sound resistant from all the other floors, but when she woke up at around two in the morning, she heard a strange pounding. At first, she had just assumed that it was her head, but when the faint sound of a guitar kicked in, she realized someone was playing music above her- even though the only thing above them was the rooftop- and they were playing music extremely loud considering it was nearly _ four-twenty in the morning. _

She had waited a few minutes to see if it was just her imagination before deciding to go see what the hell was going on herself.

The doors opened to the floor, and she had to do a double-take as to what the fuck she was seeing.

Ant-Man, a glowing woman, and two kids- one of which was wearing a Spider-Man costume that looked suspiciously like the real thing- were on the roof, with the woman on guitar, Scott on drums, Spidey-kid singing, and the last kid throwing glitter everywhere while the first rays of sun started showing themselves for the day, as the music blasted throughout the air of the Avengers compound. 

Everyone mentioned looked like they were having the time of their lives as they played a slightly changed version of the _ Hannah Montana _ theme song (yes Pepper knew the theme song).

It was a mystical sight that made Pepper question if she’d been drugged.

No one had ever mentioned that five am was the magical time you came face-to-face with the sparkling Spider-Man. If Pepper had known what being awake at four am was like this, she would’ve been staying up with Tony this whole time.

For once she was at a loss for words, not that she would’ve been heard if she _ did _ have words for this, since the music was blasting too loudly for anything to be heard.

No one seemed to notice her until she walked up to the kid filming it all on his phone, and tapped his shoulder, resulting in an unflattering shriek to be heard, followed by the band pausing their performance as they recognized the new company.

Spidey looked beyond embarrassed, while the kid closet to her looked like he was about to freak out either from excitement or fear- it was hard to tell- Scott looked like a kid who had just stolen a cookie from the jar, while the woman just stood there cooly, if only slightly confused, but gave Pepper a nod in greeting.

“You're filming this with your phone?” Was all Pepper could think of asking, which caused everyone (minus Carol who still wasn’t entirely sure what was happening, but was curiously observing) to drop into an even more stunned silence.

“Uh, it was all we had…” the kid replied.

“Mr. Stark locked us out of his labs,” the other kid explained- after getting a second look at him she realized that he was, in fact, Spider-Man.

Perhaps it was the lack of sleep that embraced her brain, but Pepper was suddenly overwhelmed with… not anger, more like frustration. Frustration that this amazing scene before her almost had been erased from history by a terrible phone camera. Luckily, she had arrived just in time.

“You're not using a phone camera for this,” She stated firmly.

“But we don’t have any other cameras,” Spidey started. “And even though Ned and I could probably hack into there eventually, we don’t really have the time-“

“Any camera will be better than the phone, even security cameras.” She said without thinking too much about her words.

“Wait- the security cameras?”

“Yes, Tony has the best resolution on them, that way no one can avoid facial recognition- it’s a safety feature.”

There was a beat of silence.

“Can we use one of them Miss Potts?”

“It’s better than using your phone.”

* * *

It was almost five when Peter returned with a few security cameras.

Pepper had told him that one of the best ones were on the Avengers level, and he had volunteered to go get it, since he was, in his own words,_ ‘one sticky boi’, _ and it would be easier for him to get it.

He retrieved around five different ones, since Pepper insisted on getting as many different angles as they could, and no one argued because _ it’s Pepper _, and that would be pretty much as bad as picking a fight with MJ.

————————————————

It was around five-ten when they finally decided they were good enough to film, as Ned was in charge of the cameras, and Pepper was in charge of directing them along with navigating glitter.

It was five-forty when they finally decided it was perfect.

It was six when they were all in the kitchen making different things for breakfast which they would all sit down and share together.

It was now six-thirty, and they were sitting around the kitchen table with pancakes and fruit (courtesy of Peter and Ned), Bacon and sausage (Carol), eggs and potatoes (Pepper), and Scott just got the toast ready (still important!), but he also went out to but orange juice and actual oranges since the compound never carried for some reason- which Peter explained was because after he developed a ‘slight’ allergy to peppermint and lavender, Mr. Stark went crazy about banning anything he might get a slight reaction from, which meant no foods that spiders found repulsive.

It was a pretty odd scene if you were to see it from an outsiders perspective, but even though most of these people hardly knew each other, or hadn’t even met, they acted as if they’d known each other they’re whole lives, and despite the obvious opportunity for it to become awkward, they were more than comfortable with one another.

* * *

It was seven-fifteen when Carol and Scott left to go back home, and seven-fifty when Pepper, Peter, and Ned finished cleaning up the kitchen and roof, along with reinstalling and erasing the videos off of the cameras after uploading the footage to Ned’s laptop and left for Mr. Stark’s floor to collapse in tiredness.

* * *

It was eight am when the Avengers returned home.

* * *

When the small group that had formed earlier that morning woke up once again later that day, however, none of then believed what had happened that dawn was actually real, since it pretty much went far past the border of realistic dream material, and went straight by towards the ‘_ what the actual FUCK’ _ dream material. 

Not to mention that this was not necessarily a sort of dream you would want to mention to anyone. It wasn’t like Pepper could waltz up to Tony and say _ ‘I dreamt I threw a Disney channel concert with your mentee and a glowing lady last night,' _ or for Carol to call up Fury and ask _ ‘what the _ hell _ is _ Best of Both Worlds, _ and why do I have it stuck in my head?’ _ Peter honestly didn’t want to know if it was real or not, since if it was real, he would probably die of embarrassment, and Ned…

Ned had the footage on his laptop and had started to edit it to the best of his ability (which he was actually incredibly skilled at).

And poor Scott wasn’t sure what on earth to do with this dream that seemed real, so he phoned Luis until his friend started telling him about this guy that he knew, who had this cousin, and… long story short, it was pretty whacked out when you assumed your dreams were real and could lead to some really awkward situations.

The only thing that seemed slightly suspicious, is that all of them were overtired- including Pepper- and had woken up incredibly late.

Peter looked up at the camera they had stolen from the Avengers floor. He wasn’t sure if he had put it back up in his dream, but there it was, back on the wall. If it was there now, then that must mean that it never happened…

* * *

You might think that would’ve been the end of the story, the band that was a one-hit-wonder, but no actually, it wasn’t.

In the following weeks, Peter and Ned came up with the idea of performing songs at ungodly hours in the morning, and decided to carry them out in similar fashion- the compound would be empty, and Peter would get the strange idea to call Scott and Carol, the two heroes actually _ coming, _and Pepper being woken up and taking charge of the situation to make it run smoothly, then they would all have breakfast.

The strange thing was that none of them dared to question if it was real or not, maybe because part of them was hoping it wasn’t a dream, while the other part was desperately hoping it _ was _ a dream.

So they ignored it, and lived purely in the moment enjoying each other’s company along with the relaxed atmosphere of having no judgment, no expectations…

The only one that was completely aware of the reality of the situation was Ned, as he was the one editing and saving the videos, but he kinda just thought that everyone was ignoring what happened during those odd nights…

* * *

And no, they did _ not _ remember to vacuum the glitter off of the roof, so there was ominous glitter falling from the sky for _ weeks _ after.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the closest I've ever come to writing crack, but honestly, it's the most fun I've had writing a chapter in a while, and I really hope you guys enjoyed it even though it was pretty unbelievable- but hey, this is a fic that dwells on unbelievability!
> 
> lol were ya'll expecting Pepper to finally have a speaking role????
> 
> ((BTW HAPPY ARO AWARENESS WEEK TO ALL MY FELLOW ARO-SPECTREMS OUT THERE- YOU'RE ALL VAID))
> 
> anyways, thanks for reading!! <3


	10. Heeey! whatsup mr. bumblebeeeee!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> more vents, more sunflowers, more confusion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so I guess we all know why I have the time to post- stay safe out there everyone

It all started when Tony and Pepper left to take a well-deserved trip for the weekend.

They shouldn't have had anything to worry about considering the Avengers were staying at the compound, it was their home, and it was pretty often that the two of them were gone… so like, this situation was more than normal, you could almost say... it was painfully average.

So yeah, leave a bunch of adults together for a weekend, and what could go wrong?

It could all go to shit when a teenager was involved.

It probably started though, when Scott asked if he could borrow something from Stark’s lab, and made the drive to the compound to pick it up. Or maybe it started when Peter realized he’d forgotten his work uniform (yes, he finally got another part-time job- mostly cuz MJ was getting suspicious) back at the compound, and Ned, who was visiting his cousin offered to drive him over as long as he could step in quickly and say hi to everyone (and take a few selfies with them to show off to his relatives).

So yeah, maybe there were differing reasons as to why things went wrong, but nonetheless, it seemed like chaos seemed to follow wherever the red-clad insect friends chose to go, and more often than not, it roped in the rest of the avengers.

And today wasn’t about to be any different.

As Ned drove up to the compound, Peter fished around in his backpack to find his intern card, which allowed them in  _ and _ allowed free parking, which was great. And everything seemed to be going great too, as they casually stepped into the elevator, Ned stopping at the Avengers floor, and Peter going up to Mr. Stark’s floor and into his room where he started his search for his uniform.

Meanwhile, Scott had also arrived a few minutes after, and began the frustrating process of trying to explain he was here to pick up a certain chemical that Stark had agreed to give him… only it was slightly more complicated than usual since he had forgotten his Avengers-pass back at home.

Thankfully Clint and Wanda happened to be walking out when they saw him, and let him borrow one of their passes before going for a walk, and Scott was soon on his way down, walking among the dark hallways before finding the right room and heading in.

* * *

Peter sighed to himself as he looked through his room, still unable to find his uniform after fifteen minutes of searching. Hopefully Ned wasn’t in too much of a hurry to leave.

He had looked pretty much everywhere in his room, which meant it was probably somewhere else- the lab, maybe? It was worth a shot at the very least.

Tiredly, he trudged down the hallway towards the lab and entered the lab code, stepping inside before miserably looking around to see if it was anywhere in sight. He didn’t feel like putting in the effort to walk around.

_ “Mr. Parker, may I ask why you’re in the boss’s lab?”  _ Friday suddenly spoking, causing him to straighten up in surprise.

“Uh, sorry Friday, I’m just looking for my work uniform, I left it somewhere in the compound, but it’s not in my room, so it must be here- don’t worry, I’ll be out as soon as I find it,” he promised.

“ _ Very well. Perhaps I can be of some assistance in your search?”  _ the AI volunteered.

“You can do that?”

“ _ Of course- I’m very advanced. I’ll commence a search through the videos from the last time you were here. Please allow for a few minutes before results.” _

“Awesome, thanks Fri,” Peter said with relief before throwing himself on the nearest chair and letting the wheels drift him away a few steps. He wasn’t often lazy (well,  _ too _ often) but today he was quite honestly considering wheeling this chair around as his mode of transportation instead of walking.

“ _ Mr. Parker, I believe I found what you were looking for,”  _ Friday informed him.

“A way not to feel the crushing tiredness of being alive?”

“ _ No, I’ve located your uniform- although I can contact a theri-” _

“It’s ok, just-just the uniform is good,” He said hurriedly. “Um, where  _ is _ my uniform?” 

_ “In the basement, in one of the cold rooms used to keep the more volatile chemicals. _ ”

“The fuck-” he half-questioned himself before pushing up off the chair, grabbing a lollipop off of Mr. Stark’s desk, and heading to the elevators, finally with an end in sight for his mission.

* * *

Scott made his way down the hallway, eager for this to be over so he could go eat something. Probably a hot dog, he really felt like a hot dog…

He cued the Avengers-card and walked through the door, sighing as he looked upon the rows and rows of chemicals, realizing the small writing on the barrels, unsure why they couldn’t have been written in a larger font so it’d be easier to read, but there wasn’t anything he could do about it now, so he got to work reading the labels.

* * *

Steve had gotten the alert that someone was in Tony’s lab, but when he saw it was the intern, he thought nothing of it- that kid was always there, and Tony probably allowed him clearance, so there was no reason for him to worry about it.

It  _ was _ the slightest bit odd that he had spent so little time there though, but it still wasn’t much to worry about, right?

Steve went back to his workout, his mind drifting between thoughts, when he got yet  _ another _ alert, this time for the chemical locker downstairs… he attempted to check the security camera, but it had somehow been disabled.

It was near impossible to get into that place, so perhaps it had only been a worker who already had access? Or maybe the intern?

Either way, it was better to be safe than sorry, and Steve felt like taking a break anyways, so he headed down himself, only stopping to put on a hazmat suit, recalling what happened that  _ last time... _

Steve had to admit that this place was never the most comforting- sure he was used to labs and dangerous chemicals, but this place was different, almost always deserted, always cold, and filled with explosives.

It was nearly the same security clearance as the Avengers floor, with only a few workers having access, which is why the alert had been worrying. 

He reached the door to the room that had it’s camera disabled, and went in, shutting the door behind him

* * *

Peter knew his super-senses tended to heighten when he was nervous, and being in dark, closed spaces (even though the room was actually quite big) made him incredibly tense, so when he heard a large  _ clang _ that sounded like the door closing, he told himself it was probably just the floor above. Then again, he  _ had _ been hearing footsteps the entire time he was here, coming along the rows of metal shelves, stocked with different chemicals- that was probably just from upstairs as well, right?

He shivered slightly as he continued his search, walking down the aisle when he looked through the shelves and saw the shadow of another person. He ducked out of sight, trying not to panic.

_ Calm down Parker, it’s just a worker! Why would it be anyone else? Even though they weren’t wearing a lab coat- maybe they just wanted to take it off and chill! Even though I’m not sure why they’d take it off before coming into contact with chemicals... _

He reasonably decided to check the security cameras on his phone, but they were disabled in this room and this room alone. He checked the heat signatures and saw that he wasn’t alone in the room- there were two others in here with him.

_ Shitshitshitshit. _

Quickly he pulled out his phone and turned the brightness down. He needed to get this room on lockdown, figure out who was in here, and then everything would be fine.

_ Ned I need ur help _

He waited with bated breath for his friend to respond, hoping against all odds that Ned’s phone battery wasn’t dead.

_ What’s wrong??? Did u find ur uniform?? _

_ Nono ok look I need u to go to mr. starks lab I don’t have time to explain _

_ K 1 sec _

Peter sighed with relief and decided to move to a different place, wanting to keep away from the intruders for now

_ Ok I’m here, but u gotta let me in the lab _

Peter unlocked the door from his phone and continued to instruct Ned on how to put the single room on lockdown as he headed to the door, figuring he’d call Wanda or Steve to help him with the intruders since he didn’t want to be locked in here with them, and it’d be pretty sketchy if a weak kid like him was able to take them out.

_ Ok it's ready for lockdown,  _ Ned texted.

_ Great ima head for the door I’ll let u know when to lock it _ , Peter replied before quickly heading towards the door- he was almost there when-

_ “Attention, attention”  _ Friday suddenly blared through the building speakers. “ _ The compound will be on a full shut-down for the next 24 hours until further notice due to intruders. Please find somewhere safe to hide. We are working on resolving the situation as soon as we can. Thank you.” _

Well shit.

* * *

Backing up, Ned had really thought this whole ‘stopping at the Avengers mansion’ thing was gonna go smoothly- especially considering that he’s done this sort of thing before.

So stopping by to get some photos with the Avengers? No biggie.

Peter had gone to go find his uniform, so Ned figured he had around fifteen minutes to find one or more Avenger and snap a pic with them (it was weird that he hadn’t done it before, but whatever).

He walked down the hall and into the common room, where Sam was watching a movie- by the sound of it a horror. Sam gave him a wave and offered to join, but Ned passed, thanking him for the offer and moving onwards to the kitchen- the prime place where the Avengers usually hung out.

And while it was lacking its usual traffic, Rhodey was calmly cooking, looking like he was enjoying the rare quietness that would soon be cut short- Ned almost felt bad for interrupting him, but he’d be leaving soon, and it wasn’t like he could follow Peter to Mr. Stark’s floor, and he wasn’t big on horror movies (even just for a few minutes) so chilling in the kitchen with arguably the most relaxed Avenger seemed like the best option for now.

“Hey Rhodey!” Ned greeted cheerfully as he stepped into the kitchen, causing the man to turn in surprise at his voice.

“Ned?” Rhodey asked, a hint of skepticism in his voice. “What’re you doing here? I didn’t think Spider-Man was over today.”

_ Shittttt _ , Ned realized all too late that he had no excuse to be here, since Spider-Man, in fact, was  _ not _ here- thus giving him, Spider-Man’s ‘son’ absolutely no excuse to be here either.

“O-oh, yeah, he’s not around today, just off saving the city and what-not,” he explained with an awkward laugh. “I was just in the area and thought I’d come by and say hi!”

Rhodey nodded but didn’t say anything more, instead he just went back to stirring his food as Ned debated whether or not he should go down by the main entrance to wait instead.

Usually Rhodey was one of the nicest Avengers, but recently he had been acting stand-offish towards him.

Suddenly Ned’s phone buzzed, showing a text from Peter asking him to go to Mr. Stark’s lab. So he quickly said goodbye to Rhodey, following Peter’s instructions until he was finally in the lab at the main computer. 

Now, Ned liked to think of himself as a pretty good hacker, but this was Tony-freakin-Stark’s computer, and if he got one thing wrong, then this would all go to shit. 

Every time Peter texted him with new instructions and he typed them in, his heart beat a little faster, afraid that it’d be wrong, or someone would find him or…

No, he had to focus.

Peter had just sent in the final directions, and Ned had followed them, now ready for the single room to be put on lockdown. All he had to do was wait for the ‘go-ahead’ from Peter, and everything would be ok-

“What do you think you’re doing here?” a voice suddenly asked, causing Ned to whip around to see Rhodey standing defensively in the doorway.

“Oh, um, Mr. Rhodey sir-”  _ whatdoIdowhatdoIdo.  _ “Sorry I didn’t see you there!”

The colonel stepped forward, with an unimpressed look on his face. “Did you really think you could get away with this?”

“G-get away with what?”

Rhodey felt slightly bad when he saw how nervous Ned had become as soon as they set foot on Tony’s floor. He had wanted to make sure no one could hear them up here, but now he could tell Ned was a thousand times more scared… unless this was just an act- which he was fairly sure of now. But either way, it was time for this show to end for Ned, and to put a stop to whatever he was planning.

“I know who you are,” Rhodey began. “Or should I say who you  _ aren’t _ .”

“Wh-what?”

“I know you aren’t Spider-man’s son, Ned.”

“Huh? O-of course I am,” Ned laughed nervously. “I mean, why else would I be here? I wouldn’t know Spider-Man any other way, that’d just be weird. I don’t know who Spider-Man is- or at least I  _ wouldn’t _ if he wasn’t my dad, but he is my dad, so I know who he is of course, but I’m just saying that if he  _ wasn’t  _ my father, then I wouldn’t know who he was, since he’s like, older than me, so it’d be strange, right?”

Ned tried to smile, but it probably came out as more of a wince. He could really use Peter’s help right now- but at that moment he got a text from Peter. 

Peter needed  _ him _ . 

Without checking the text, Ned quickly turned around and slammed a button of the keyboard, locking off the single room, breathing out a sigh of relief when he did. Peter was safe.

“Kid what did you do-” 

_ “Attention, attention. The compound will be on a full shut-down for the next 24 hours due to intruders. Please find somewhere safe to hide. We are working on resolving the situation as soon as we can. Thank you.” _

Wrong button.

* * *

Good news? 

Peter had found his uniform.

Bad news?

They were now in lockdown mode for the next twenty-four hours, so he’d probably have to cancel his shift anyways, meaning this entire trip was a waste.

Oh yeah, and he was also trapped in a small room with possible dangerous criminals, in a room with even  _ more _ dangerous chemicals.  _ And  _ he didn’t have his spider-suit with him, so it wasn’t like he could take them out without raising suspicions- and honestly, way too many people already knew about his secret identity, and he didn’t want to add these random robbers to his list…

But that would mean he’d either have to spend the next hours hiding until someone came to rescue him-  _ if _ someone came to rescue him, or he’d have to figure a way out- He knew there was a vent leading out of this room, and if he was quick enough he might make it out of the room without being seen...

But since when did he leave criminals free to escape? There had to be a way to stop them, and he was going to figure it out… all while keeping his uniform safe-

_ Wait _ .

He glanced down at his work uniform in horror, realizing that it was the exact thing needed to stop the thieves.

* * *

It was probably an understatement to say that Scott was terrified- he was  _ beyond  _ terrified.

He’d only come for a short visit, just to grab some supplies and head out, when suddenly there were intruders and the compound was on lockdown… and now he was stuck here.

Worst of all, they hadn’t announced where the intruders were- of course, he understood the reasons why- but it was quite terrifying since he couldn’t help but wonder if they were somewhere here… in this very room…. With  _ him _ .

It didn’t help that he could’ve  _ sworn  _ he heard other footsteps- only one was off to the left, and the other was from the right- just proof he was going insane, right? Maybe the chemicals were affecting his brain? Yeah, that was it…

Just then, he spotted what he had come for- although he wasn’t exactly sure what to do with it. Should he just like, hold onto it until the doors opened? Or remember where it was and find somewhere to chill for a bit?

The second option seemed more appealing, so he walked to the back of the room looking for a place to sit when suddenly the dimmed lighting cast a shadow… a figure was behind him.

It was silent as the light flicked overhead, adding that classic touch just in case he wasn’t scared enough, and turned, only to see an overwhelmingly large person in a hazmat suit.

Just because he knew it was coming, doesn’t mean it made it any less terrifying, and if one thing’s for sure, Scott knew when a good time to screech was, and a person in a hazmat suit called for it.

What probably  _ didn’t  _ call for screaming was the flying sunflower person that jumped down from the shelves in a series of amazing flips, answering Scott’s cry for help, but that earned not only more screams from him but also hazmat suit guy who had  _ definitely _ _ not _ expected sunflower guy, jumping back in fear as sunflower guy looked ready to fight him.

Scott watched on in amazement as sunflower guy swiftly kicked hazmat guy in the head, undeterred by the fact that any of this was real, causing Scott to wonder if these guys were some B-rated Avenger wannabes that fell into the ‘closer to cartoon’ way that they only had each other as a nemesis, which led to random fights wherever they were, and sometimes they got all chummy like, and acted like friends.

It’d kinda be a cool show- like nature vs chemicals or whatever- maybe that’s why they were here! Sunflower dude was stopping hazmat’s latest nefarious plan or whatever…

His fear was now more-or-less gone, and he was more interested in seeing the relationship between these two pan out a bit more, when sunflower dude kicked of hazmat’s helmet thing, revealing-

“Steve?” Scott asked in shock. “You’re Hazmat guy?”

Steve was on the floor in pain from sunflower dude’s attacks, and suddenly Scott realized the devastating truth that sunflower dude might be a villain.

Sunflower dude suddenly flipped out after seeing Captain America, and fucking jumped up the shelves and yeeted up off the top and towards the wall, crashing into the air vent at the top of the ceiling, and disappearing among the maze of ventilation. 

“...”

“...”

“Do you think he was the intruder?” Scott finally asked.

“Oh thank god you saw him too,” Steve sighed in relief. “Come on, we need to follow him,” he instructed, walking to the nearest shelf and removing the chemicals so he could push it to where the vent was.

“We have a flower to pick.”

* * *

As Peter crawled through the vents, he regretted ever taking that job at the flower shop.

Of course there hadn’t been any serious problems, of course he’d accidentally purposely injured Cap again, and of  _ course _ he had acted without thinking and was now a fugitive.

The plus side to all this was that he was pretty sticky, and could easily climb up to higher floors until he found his room- or  _ any _ empty room- where he could change and act like none of this ever happened.

The downside was that it was arguably a lot harder to move with a giant sunflower in place of his head, and with an added downgrade on his field of vision. 

After a few minutes of struggling, he heard two other people enter the vents.

_ Great.  _ Heroes were always so persistent.

_ Wait. I’m a hero too. _

Peter shoved this cycle of confusing thoughts out of his head, and instead pushed onwards, only this time quicker… although he quickly realized the faster he went, the more the squirming sunflower of a person caused more noise. He was also learning to separate himself from the body of a teenage flower right now since it was honestly really unsettling to think about his life choices while he was on the run.

Rather than trying to find an empty room, he was now focused on taking every possible twist and turn he could take to outrun and outmaneuver the two men hot on his trail.

* * *

Steve had been in all too many bizarre circumstances lately, but chasing a flower-dressed maniac through the vents was definitely near the top of the list. This entire situation would’ve been a lot easier if Scott had been wearing his suit, but unfortunately, he was just a regular guy at the moment, meaning all they had was incredible determination to catch up.

They came to a fork in the vents and chose to veer left, unsure of where the pounding sound was coming from. Unfortunately, it seemed like that was the wrong turn to take since it became pretty distant. Steve sighed as they tried another route. Then another.

“Where is he?” Steve mumbled, frustrated with the fact that the sounds became more and more distant with each move.

“It almost sounds like he moved above us,” Scott noted unhelpfully. How on earth would that guy be able to move upwards in a suit like that?

Still, they didn’t have any better ideas, so they began to struggle upwards, wishing for once that Spider-Man was here to help.

Somehow, going up had been the right call, as the sound of a human-sized sunflower became louder as they moved forward until they came to another fork in the vents.

“Scott, you go left, I’ll take right,” Steve instructed, not wanting to chance the man getting away. The non-ant-sized man nodded and veered left, as Steve continued right, his speed increasing as he heard sounds up ahead, getting louder and louder-

Natasha and Vision were laying at an intersection of vents so they could face each other, while a collection of scrapbooking decorations lay in between them. 

“What… what are you two doing?” Steve asked, dumbfounded, pretty confident at this point that he was either asleep or somehow high.

“Ms. Romanoff was helping me work on my gift for Wanda,” Vision stated as Nat gave Steve a short nod hello.

“The compound is on lockdown,” Steve informed, unsure of what else to do.

“Yeah, we heard,” Natasha said casually. “But Clint said he and Wanda got it under control, so it's fine.”

“You’ve heard from them?”

“Yeah, he told everyone in the group chat.”

“I don’t have my phone.”

Natasha shrugged. “Well it's all good now, so the compound should be off lockdown in an hour. You can join Vision and me if you want.”

“No- no, I’m going to go see who was behind that mask,” Steve stated, wiggling backward as opposed to going forwards and barreling through their crafting supplies.

* * *

The past while had been… awkward, to say the least.

Rhodey had attempted to interrogate Ned, but Ned knew that if he opened his mouth to even speak, he wouldn’t be able to  _ stop _ talking, so he didn’t. And he  _ could _ say he and Spider-Man were friends, but then he’d have to explain why he was friends with a middle-aged man- maybe a teacher?

Peter  _ so _ owed him for this, he wasn’t good at thinking under pressure.

Rhodey, on the other hand, had refused to let him out of his sight, cuffing him and taking his phone away. He hoped that Peter might text him again, then he could claim to be friends with the intern, but Peter hadn’t messaged him since, and now he was starting to lose hope.

He just needed Peter to get him and explain everything to the colonel.

_ Soon. _

* * *

Sam had been watching horror movies pretty peacefully. Tony was gone, Steve was working out, Clint and Wanda went out for a walk, Rhodey was cooking, Ned was with Rhodey, and who knew where Natasha and Vision were?

Then the compound had shut down, which was a surprising turn of events considering everything had been so calm… but that's how it was in the movies, right?

The calm before the storm… being picked off, one by one…

Shit, he was alone. He was gonna be among the first to go, wasn’t he?

He tried to convince himself it’d be fine, but the room was dark, and silent- he couldn’t even hear Rhodey or Ned in the next room… 

But he did hear a thudding sound.

A thudding sound coming closer and closer. 

He tried to reason with himself, he really did- it could’ve just been Clint, but Clint was outside- he tried to look for his phone, but it was in the kitchen.

What if the reason the kitchen was silent was that whatever-it-was had already gotten them?

There was one final  _ thud _ , and the air vent sealing was punched out, followed by a giant sunflower falling to the ground, stumbling on its feet.

Sam was sorta expecting a ghost, but when he saw a drunk-looking flower wobbling around, he only felt confused.

He moved to punch it, but it wasn’t like the dude was harming anyone, so he sat back down, allowing the flower to wobble around some more before starting up his movie again.

It wasn’t like they could go anywhere for the moment, and flower-dude realized this too, so he joined Sam on the couch for the movie, until finally the lockdown was over and he left, giving him a small wave in thanks before heading off to who-knows-where.

* * *

Peter quickly dashed up to his room and changed out of his uniform, and back into normal clothing wear, heading to Mr. Stark’s lab to pick up Ned before-

“Ned?” he asked confusedly as he saw his best friend in handcuffs.

“Yeah,” Rhodey spoke up from behind him, taking his confusion for shock. “Guess who decided to visit today. The reason for the lockdown.”

Peter paled as he realized what happened.

“Okokokok- wait stop,” Peter said in a slightly panicked voice. “Ned you can drop it- Rhodey, Ned isn’t dangerous.”

Rhodey and Ned stopped to look at Peter uncertainly. “He- he knows I’m Spider-Man,” Peter explained awkwardly. “And  _ I _ was the one who asked him to put the compound on lockdown…”

“Alright,” Rhodey said slowly as he looked between the two boys. “So he knows who you are… but who the hell is he?”

“I’m not actually his son,” Ned provided helpfully.

“Yeah, I sorta figured that out. So who are you?”

“I’m his guy in the chair!”

“…What the hell does that mean?”

“He’s my best friend,” Peter finally explained.

“Hey, sorry,” Ned spoke up from where he was still cuffed in the chair. “But can you uncuff me please? It’s sorta uncomfortable.” 

* * *

Wanda and Clint had been returning from their walk when they saw the compound was on lockdown, with two masked people attempting to break in. They quickly caught the two people, and brought them inside to keep them captive and interrogate them.

I’d say they probably had the least stressful day (besides Nat and Vision).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pls don't question me on this, cuz I have no fucking clue what's going on either
> 
> anyways, I have three other fun chapters planned before we get to the story part of the story, so this is kinda the final stretch before things get slightly serious... 
> 
> The end is nye 
> 
> Then again, who tf knows when I’ll post the next chapter- amiright??? *sobs* lmao sorry I’m a wreck
> 
> (OK I POSTED THE CORRECT VERSION THIS TIME)


	11. Lizarbs are beautiful animals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> yes I'm going to keep putting Ned in every Available chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I know its been like, 5 months or whatever, but when I realized that I wrote a semi-crack fic that’s longer than the lightning thief, I sorta had an existential crisis
> 
> Sorry for the lack of updates y’all, I normally do most of my writing at the library and gym since i don’t have the best home situation and it’s hard to focus while stuck here. I ask that people please keep COVID19 out of the comment section, since it’s a pretty stressful topic, and any comments to include it will be deleted.
> 
> Thanks for reading, and stay safe <3

Peter whirled around in his chair, grateful that Mr. Stark had opted to go for the swivel chairs despite his constant complaining that he ‘moved too much.’

It was just another day in the lab, hanging out in one of the coolest places around, waiting for an actual superhero to come back (yes, Peter was a hero too, but still). 

When Tony had texted him earlier that week, he had promised that he had some new ‘exciting’ tech to share, but now the Avenger was almost an hour late to what they usually used as lab time, and Peter found himself in a bored anticipation- like when you’re too excited to do anything, but that also means you’re incredibly bored at the same time. That kind of thing.

“Yo, Karen, can you shuffle my music?” he asked, finally tired of the seemingly endless silence, almost sighing with relief when the music turned on and began to spin in his chair according to the song beat.

He hopped up off his chair and headed over to where Mr. Stark kept their ‘emergency’ supply of food, which pretty much just amounted to a sugar stash to keep them going through the night, and grabbed the bag of marshmallows, deciding to try and see how many he could fit in his mouth without choking, as it seemed like a good way to pass the time, seeing that no one was there lot stop him.

Hopping back on his chair, he opened the bag of marshmallows, humming along to  _ ‘the Best Day Ever’ _ from Spongebob as he leaned his head back and started to throw marshmallows in his mouth, filling it up with eighteen before he started to feel like maybe this was overkill.

But like, he had come this far, so he could be pretty proud of himself, right?

He almost wished he could smile in pride at his achievement, but at the moment, his mouth was stuck in a very fish-like manner, and he couldn’t do much of anything, so he sat there in wonder, as he spun around in a very cool lab with Spongebob music playing- and like the song said, this was really starting to feel like the best day ev-

“Hey kid, sorry I took…” Tony paused in the doorway with his eyes widened as he stared him down, hesitating to come in, as if Peter were holding up a gun in warning, and not defenselessly spinning around on a chair, incapable of even speaking. 

_ Oh shit _ .

Peter coughed in surprise, only he couldn’t, because… marshmallows.

Quickly he spit them out in the garbage can under his desk, before weakly asking Karen to turn off his music.

Mr. Stark sighed, and walked in, making a  _ ‘why-does-this-not-surprise-me _ ’ sort of gesture as he walked over, a large sheet in his hand.

“Sorry I took so long kid,” he restated. “But I see you found a way to occupy yourself, so…”

“Can we forget that ever happened?” he asked quietly.

“Not a chance. Anyway, this is what I wanted to show you,” he declared, handing over the folded up fabric.

It felt stiff but thin, closer to what you might make a formal suit out of, opposed to a super suit.

“What’s special about it?” he asked after examining it carefully, and finally concluding that at least on the surface, there wasn’t much there- but if anyone knew about deceiving appearances, it was him.

“Watch,” his mentor instructed, taking out his watch, and pushing several buttons before the fabric slowly began to turn invisible.

Peter’s eyes widened as he turned the now invisible fabric over in his hands.

“This is so awesome,” he whispered in awe,

“I know,” Mr. Stark agreed. “It’s only a prototype, something new- we’re still working out the kinks- it can only stay invisible for an hour before it recharges, but it’s pretty good. It’ll make going stealth a lot easier.”

“Yeah, no kidding.”

“Do you wanna see how I made it?”

“Yes, obviously.”

And with that, the two of them went to another part of the lab, neither noticing when the fabric slid off the table, and into the open backpack of Peter Parker.

That’s how things started to go wrong.

Now thankfully, nothing else that day had gone wrong, and Peter was able to return home without any further complications.

The reason why he went home, though, instead of staying over for the night like he usually did, was because Pepper was holding a dinner for all Stark employees the next night, which would be held in Brooklyn- which Peter was also invited to, along with Ned- although honestly speaking, he wasn’t entirely sure if he was supposed to come as Spider-Man or not, but didn’t want to bother Mr. Stark or Happy with such a trivial question, so instead he just opted with bringing his suit along with him in his backpack so he could change if needed.

He was now headed to Ned’s house, enjoying the evening air, allowing it to calm him before having to deal with being in a high-class event, quickening his pace slightly once he noticed the time, until he finally came to Ned’s house, knocking on the door as a warning before stepping in.

“Yo Ned!” he called out front the doormat, taking off his shoes and stepping into the living room. “Are you ready yet?”

“Sorry Peter,” Ned apologized, walking in from the kitchen. “I had this last-minute babysitting thing, we just have to wait for my mom to come back, then we can go.”

“Babysitting?” Peter asked, flopping on the couch and opening his backpack to grab his water bottle.

“Yeah, well, more like pet-sitting, it-”

Just then, the front door opened, pausing their conversation.

“Oh good, she’s back- hold on, I gotta ask her something,” Ned explained before heading off.

Peter nodded before deciding to head over to the kitchen and refill his water bottle before they headed off, coming back in the family room at the same time as Ned.

“Everything good?” he asked.

“Yep, she’s gonna take care of Gale.”

“Gale?”

“The neighbor’s pet,” he explained. “Come on, let’s go.”

Peter quickly grabbed his backpack from the floor, throwing his water in it before zipping it up and throwing it over his shoulder, following Ned out the door to his car, blasting ‘Good Time’ as they headed to the venue, unaware that they would not, in fact, have a good time.

* * *

They stepped inside the banquet hall, the invitation gripped tightly in Peter’s hand as they walked through the main hall, both of them equally surprised that they were let in, although neither of them admitted it.

Though now that they were inside, Peter was regretting bringing his backpack with him.

On one hand, he knew how panicked he would’ve been had he not brought the suit, but on the other hand, he didn’t know what to do with it.

It didn’t feel safe to leave it in the car, and there was no way he was going to put it in the coat check, even if it was beyond unlikely that the workers would look inside, but he would never be able to relax.

Now he was just wishing he had gone for the option of wearing the suit underneath his suit, even though that was incredibly uncomfortable to do for a whole night, speaking from past experience. 

So instead he just sighed, readjusting the straps in a way that he hoped made it less noticeable, walking into the main hall alongside Ned, only to be incredibly put off by the large room filled with adults milling around tables, unsure as to where they fit in in all this.

“Mr. Stark said that there’d be other kids our age, but I don’t see anyone,” he stated, glancing around nervously. “Some school or other won tickets…”

“Midtown?” Ned asked with dread.

“Thankfully, no. Though at this point, I honestly wouldn’t mind.”

“Hey Ned,” a voice came from behind them, both of them turning to see Natasha and Vision there, the former smiling in welcome. She gave a small nod to Peter, seemingly to make up for the fact that she probably didn’t remember his name. 

“Hi Ms. Romanov,” Ned greeted cheerfully, as Peter awkwardly stepped back, not wanting to seem intrusive.

“I didn’t know you were going to be here,” she stated. “Is Spidey here too?”

“Yeah- no, well, he was invited, but he couldn’t make it…”

“Ah, I see. Well, it’s nice to have you here then- just don’t tell Clint, he’ll try and use this opportunity to bribe you or something.”

“Duly noted,” Ned said with a laugh.

During this time though, Peter was admittedly feeling rather tense, and not because of the super spy casually having a conversation with his best friend who couldn’t lie to save his life, but instead because of the android that was staring him down throughout the entire conversation.

He attempted to smile, to look away, to feign ignorance, but no matter what, Vision’s, well, vision, never faltered, and it was unnerving.

Peter would be lying if he said that he hadn’t spent a lot of time with Vision. It wasn’t anything personal, it was just the way things had worked out.

Now though, he was wishing he had taken a little more time to get to know him, then maybe that way he wouldn’t be wondering why the fuck he was being stared down.

He finally forced himself to pay attention to the conversation that Ned was having with Nat, waving goodbye as the two of them left, foolishly feeling relief that Vision was now leaving, when the android stopped beside him, and quietly whispered “You might want to be careful about what you carry in your backpack Mr. Parker,” before following after Natasha, leaving Peter frozen in terror.

“Peter?”

“...I think he knows, Ned. He probably picked up on my suit’s scan or something.”

“Well, maybe you have something weird in your backpack?” Ned suggested weakly.

“The only thing I’m carrying that is slightly weird, is my suit.”

“Come on, maybe you have like, a science experiment in it or something? He knows you intern for Mr. Stark, right? What if it’s related to that? Let’s go check, ok?” Ned said quietly, leading Peter away from the crowd into a quieter corner where they could go through his backpack in privacy.

After checking quickly that they were mostly alone, Peter carefully opened his backpack, showing Ned the mostly empty insides, with his suit being the main attention factor.

“See? I told you, nothing’s- WHAT THE FUCK?”

And this?

This is when things went to shit.

Because while his backpack had seemed relatively empty, that was but the magic of science at work, or more specifically, the invisible sheet.

But that magic couldn’t work forever, and much like the nursery rhyme ‘pop-goes-the-weasel,’ the very creature Ned had been petsitting popped out of his backpack in a majestic leap, rightly scaring the two teens who hadn’t expected a jump scare at that moment, before it scurried away.

“Gale?” Ned whispered in terror, causing Peter to turn to his best friend in shookness.

“That... was Gale?”

The only response he received was a miserable nod.

Great.

“But how did she get in your backpack?”

“We can figure that out later, first we gotta get her back-”

“Hey, what’s up guys?” Scott asked, causing both boys to jump at the sudden appearance.

“H-hey Mr- uh, Scott,” Peter greeted weakly. “Not much, we’re just- um, hanging. What’re you doing here anyway? I thought it was just Stark employees and the Avengers?”

“Yeah, but since Pym and Stark industries are trying to work together, we were invited.”

“Oh, that’s cool. So Ms. Hope is here too?”

“Yeah, she’s-”

“Sorry Scott,” Ned interrupted nervously. “But Peter and I have some urgent business to take care of right now.”

“Right. Ned let’s-”

“Mr. Parker.”

Peter froze at hearing his mentor’s voice- what was he, the inconvenient spot for literally everyone to come meet up?

“Hey Mr. Stark! Thanks for inviting us, this party’s really great,” he fibbed. Well, it wasn’t like the party wasn’t great, but it just was that he wasn’t having a great time because of the panic.

Tony seemed to pick up on it, though decided to let it go, only with a glance of concern geared towards him. Or so it seemed.

“Why don’t I take you around kid, introduce you to some people? Though just a disclaimer: some of them might be a little boring for you, but I mean, you’ve spent time with Cap, so how bad can it be?”

The PSA’s came to mind, and Peter gratefully accepted that things  _ could _ be a lot worse. Though this was still pretty bad…

“You can go, Peter, it’s ok,” Ned assured, even though desperation leaked through his voice, causing Tony to look up in surprise. 

“Ned, you can come too of course,” he stated, almost offended that Ned thought he’d been left out, making this much harder to refuse without revealing that there was an animal on the loose.

But this situation would also have a lot less repercussions if the two teens could solve this on their own… or maybe they didn’t have to limit the situation to the two of them…

“That’d be great Mr. Stark, thank you- Ned, why don’t you go on? I’ll catch up, I need some water first.”

Ned nodded, still worried but thankful, while the billionaire just cocked an eyebrow, but eventually walked off with Ned, glancing back to see if Peter was still there before disappearing into the crowd.

“Scott,” Peter stated, turning to the man in question who had been standing off to the side for a while, unsure if he was still apart of the conversation, but not wanting to seem rude by wandering off, startling him slightly.

“Yep, I’m still here,” he stated, seemingly more for himself than anything.

“Do you mind helping Ned and me? I’m really sorry, I know you’re a guest and everything, but I feel like we can trust you and I don’t want Mr. Stark stressed about the party going wrong and Ms. Pepper has already worked so hard I don’t wan-”

“Whoa, don’t worry Spidey, I can help,” Scott calmed. “Now what do you need help with?”

“Ned lost his- well it’s not  _ his _ pet, but he was pet-sitting, and she got in my backpack, but I didn’t realize, and now it’s too late, and she’s running loose at the party somewhere and we need to find her,” he quickly stated, feeling as if he’d left something out.

“Alright, no problem, I’ll tell Hope, and we’ll start looking- what’s her name?”

“Oh right! That’s what I forgot: her name is Gale.”

“Gale, got it. I’ll call you if we spot her first,” he promised before heading off, leaving Peter to head off and find Mr. Stark and Ned, hopefully freeing his best friend to help with the search.

He easily found the two of them, with his mentor introducing Ned to a few workers Peter had seen in passing around the compound. 

Stepping up to join them, Peter couldn’t help but feel like there was something off about all of this. Usually, he was the one out there trying to fix his own mistakes, but for right now, he was just talking to people, pretending that nothing was wrong. And there wasn’t anything wrong! After all, Scott had promised to handle it, and other than that, things would be  _ fine. _

Eventually Tony had gone off to help Pepper briefly, leaving the two teens alone to nervously walk through the crowd of fancy people.

“Excuse me,” a sudden voice spoke up from behind him, startling him slightly while Ned just gave him a quick look like  _ ‘I thought you had that spider-sense?’ _ which Peter chose to ignore in favour of not being called-out, and instead turned to once again see Vision next to him.

“Oh, um, hey,” he greeted warily. “Can I help you?”

The android shook his head. “I believe I might be able to help you, Mr. Parker,” he informed, leaving Peter to realize how hard it was to reply to someone when they were saying something that sounded slightly threatening, but also genuinely helpful. So instead of one of his usual quick remarks, he ended up awkwardly laughing.

“Yeah, I’m sure you can,” he choked out nervously, earning him another amused glance from Ned as Vision simply cocked his head in slight confusion before giving a slow nod.

“Well then,” Vision broke through the silence that had begun to lapse over them. “it ‘s concerning the creature in your backpack- it’s gone.”

“Ohh-  _ oh, _ ok, good.” Peter felt the relief wash over him as he realized that his identity was safe from the android, though his reply confused Vision to a greater extent. 

“You… wished to be rid of her?”

“What? No, I- wait, you can track where she is?”

“Yes.”

“Where is she? Wait, can you help us get her?”

“Yes, follow me,” the android instructed before heading off through the crowd, leaving the two of them to follow after him, careful not to lose track of where he was headed.

Soon enough, the trio emerged into the lobby, everything much quieter, as they stood at the ready, staring down the polished tiles as if Gale could come scrambling down them any minute.

“She’s not here,” Ned stated disappointedly after a moment.

“My sensors are picking up her life form,” Vision stated matter-of-factly. “Though you are correct, she does not appear to be here.”

“That’s… weird.”

“Yes,” Vision agreed before slowly looking up at the ceiling. “But I believe I have discovered her hiding place.”

“Really? Where?” Peter asked before realizing where Vision was pointing. “Oh shit, please don’t-”

“The ventilation system” Vision finished.

“Great.”

“I’m afraid I cannot help you much further,” Vision apologised. 

“It’s ok, we’ll figure it out- thanks Vision.”

The android nodded. “Please tell me if there is anything I can help with.” and with that, he returned to the party, leaving the two teens to stare at the ceiling in defeat until Peter sighed. 

“I’ll get my suit.”

* * *

Scott was admittedly having some fun looking around for Ned’s lost… pet? Eh, Scott was pretty good with any sort of animal, so it wasn’t like it’d be a problem.

Though after some time scouring the room without so much as a frightened scream from someone spotting an animal, he decided to head out to the lobby, hoping that it hadn’t escaped through the main doors already.

Instead, he was faced with Peter trying to inconspicuously climb up the walls, only to hop down the moment one of the workers walked by. 

Scott walked up to them, realizing that this either had something to do with Gale, or they were just finding indescribable entertainment in wall-climbing. “Any news on your pet?” he asked as he approached the two kids.

“She’s in the vents,” Ned informed miserably.

“Hey, that’s pretty good! You know where she is,  _ and _ you know that no one’s going to notice her. Plus, now you have someone who can crawl in there for you.”

“Scott, you’re the best,” Peter stated tiredly- geez, that kid looked like he needed a break. “You’d do that?”

“Of course. I’ll just go grab my suit- why don’t you two head back inside?” 

Thankfully the two teens easily agreed to this, which Scott was glad for- they both seemed tired, and they shouldn’t be spending a party worrying about something as easy to take care of as a lost pet- and soon Gale wouldn’t be a lost pet, she’d be found one.

* * *

Peter was honestly really grateful to Scott for doing this- it was sorta nice to have him to help out with normal stuff like this. Sure, he had the Avengers there for battle back up, and Mr. Stark, Ned, and May were always there for him regardless, but still, it was nice to have someone else who knew both sides of him… maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to have the other avengers too- but Peter pushed that thought out of his mind. Maybe one day it would happen, but not any time soon.

Peter and Ned found their way over to a table, taking a few minutes to relax before starting to talk amongst themselves, and soon the subject of Gale and Scott had seemed to disappear from their thoughts until Hope walked up to where they were sitting.

“Have you seen Scott recently? He’s not picking up his phone,” she explained after briefly greeting the two.

“Oh, right- I think he’s still in the ventilation system right now,” Ned explained thoughtfully.

Suddenly, a screech echoed through the hall, bringing all conversations to a halt as banging was heard from above, causing everyone to look up in fear, wondering what destiny would bring them.

Destiny ended up bringing them a middle-aged man screaming at the top of his lungs as he fell from the heavens, wrestling an iguana, while also holding it tight so it wouldn’t be harmed by the fall. A selfless act, if there ever was, though the iguana probably didn’t see it as one.

And it was in this moment, that the teenager Peter Parker, also known as Spider-Man, who also got top grades, realized that he never bothered to mention to Scott that Gale was an iguana.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So fun thing abt me, I have ADHD and hyper-focus a lot, so despite not updating for a while, I just wrote 3 different chapters for three different fics for three different fandoms and I have no idea when I'll update again (tho I have like 500 words left to write on one of them fics... but eh, I'm tired so I'll do it tomorrow/later today)
> 
> Though I did wanna say thank you to savvysass who checked up on me on tumblr- you’re super sweet, thank you (also sorry that I really suck at general human interaction, but seriously, you’re great <3)
> 
> (also rip to that one marvel fic abt Peter getting amnesia that I totally forgot about for like, six months now or smtg, idk)


End file.
